


Die by the drop

by Ischa



Category: Original Work
Genre: Big Bang Challenge, Crossdressing, F/M, M/M, Non-Graphic Violence, Sexual Content, Supernatural Elements, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-11
Updated: 2011-10-11
Packaged: 2017-10-24 12:54:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 39,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/263691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ischa/pseuds/Ischa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Things Emila has to deal with since she met William: more Hunters, love-sick vampires, shadow-men, sinister plans, conspiracies, telling him all about the great vampire revolution, stupid humans, bad writing, her own past catching up with her and well, her feelings for William and the boy he's in love with. And then there are of course the days when she doesn't feel like being sane at all.</p><p><i>He laughs. “This is not Interview With the Vampire.” He takes a deep drag of his smoke. “You know we can’t do this.”<br/>“I really wish we could read people’s minds,” she says wistful.<br/>“Yeah, things would be so much easier if we could, but the dark gift and all that…”<br/>“Yeah, basically we’re all the same.”<br/>“Except for me.”<br/>“Except for you,” she answers. “Get out, feed, get laid. I don’t like you much when you’re a cranky bitch.”<br/>“I don’t like me much either when I’m a cranky bitch,” he says, exhaling smoke. She kisses his cheek and leaves him alone.<br/>He really needs to eat something. Lately even Dimitri looks delicious to him. But maybe it’s because he’s Andrej’s family.<br/>Which is all kinds of fucked-up. </i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Last of the boys

**Title:** Die by the drop  
 **Pairing:** M/F, M/M  
 **Rating:** R  
 **Summary:** Things Emila has to deal with since she met William: more Hunters, love-sick vampires, shadow-men, sinister plans, conspiracies, telling him all about the great vampire revolution, stupid humans, bad writing, her own past catching up with her and well, her feelings for William and the boy he's in love with. And then there are of course the days when she doesn't feel like being sane at all.  
 _He laughs. “This is not Interview With the Vampire.” He takes a deep drag of his smoke. “You know we can’t do this.”  
“I really wish we could read people’s minds,” she says wistful.  
“Yeah, things would be so much easier if we could, but the dark gift and all that…”  
“Yeah, basically we’re all the same.”  
“Except for me.”  
“Except for you,” she answers. “Get out, feed, get laid. I don’t like you much when you’re a cranky bitch.”  
“I don’t like me much either when I’m a cranky bitch,” he says, exhaling smoke. She kisses his cheek and leaves him alone.  
He really needs to eat something. Lately even Dimitri looks delicious to him. But maybe it’s because he’s Andrej’s family.  
Which is all kinds of fucked-up. _  
**Warning(s):** disturbing, violence, coss-dressing, sex, vampires, mentions of torture  
 **Author’s Notes:**   I want to thank my wonderful artist, my awesome mixer \o/ my betas and the mods for their great work. Title by The Death Weather  
Mix: [Between eternity and them](http://theworlditgoes.livejournal.com/5580.html )  
Art: coming soon  
 **Word Count:** 41.298  
 **Beta:** asm_z, tygermine (thank you so much!)  
 **Disclaimer:** My literary property

 **Part I  
Last of the boys**

~1~  
Andrej blinks against the darkness and then sits up. The sheets make a soft rustling sound not unlike feathers in the silence. He takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. Softly. His fingers grab the washed out fabric, clench in the cloth. He takes another deep breath and as he exhales, he focuses on letting the sheets slip from his grip. It's harder than it should be; he's done it so many times already. This is the moment to make a decision. He could stay in bed, lay down again, close his eyes and try to sleep. Pretend for a while that he will succeed, count sheep maybe – even if that never worked for him, not even when he was a kid and still believed in...well, a lot of things. The other option is the one he chooses more often than not these days.

He brushes his hair behind his ear and lets his legs slip over the edge of the bed. There is a second’s hesitation before his feet hit the cold hardwood floor. He presses his toes against it and then stretches them. The hardwood floor warms slowly while he sits there, his fingers curled around the cold metal frame of the bed. His hair is in his face again, maybe he should cut it and be done with it, he thinks, but if he does, he can't hide behind its curtain anymore. He closes his eyes and breathes, counts to ten and then let’s go of the bed frame to get up.  
It's pretty stupid to sit there and wait for that small patch of floor to warm, because when he leaves it, the next bit is as cold as hardwood floors can get.  
His bare feet make soft sounds, like something is sucking gently in the darkness of the house, when he makes his way to the kitchen.  
He takes the water bottle he left on the table and goes over to the living room. On the way to the balcony he grabs the blanket from the couch and slings it around his shoulders.  
The balcony door makes a quiet creepy sound, but even that feels familiar by now. The cold is expected but still hits hard. He leans against the railing and looks at the dark city in the distance. Shadowy shapes and no stars in the sky. Andrej buries deeper into the blanket, puts the water bottle down and then sits down on the cold concrete of the balcony. His back against the wall.  
The cold helps him stay awake; he doesn't want to fall asleep out here. It would be strange if someone found him here. Not that he isn't considered strange already by some people. Maybe more than he cares to think about.

 

~+~  
Sometimes, he thinks, he misses the big cities. On nights like these, however, even this is too much to handle and he wants to be back in that small village where he spent a good portion of his childhood.  
He plays for a while with the water bottle before he gets up. His toes feel ice-cold. It's time to face the darkness inside his apartment. The silence, the loneliness he doesn't think too much about.  
Andrej feels tempted to leave the balcony door open – as he does a lot on these nights. He never does though. It would only serve as an invitation for all kinds of things.  
The boy that grew up in Eastern Europe still believes in all the nightmares, the things that go bump in the night that will eat your soul if you let them in.  
It's more of a metaphor these days for most people, but he isn't, and never was, most people.

~+~  
The bottle makes a soft sound as he puts it on the table. The counters and chairs, mugs and tins of tea are only shadows that don't even give their shape away.  
He doesn't switch the light on.

His fingers brush over the cool tabletop lightly as he walks by and leaves the kitchen with its secrets behind. The door to his bedroom is ajar. He can't remember if he closed it on his way to the balcony. Probably not. It's really late or really early – depending on how you look at it. Maybe he's slowly losing his mind.

You can never be sure if you're losing your mind when you're alone – there is no one to tell you.  
The sudden awareness that the only sound in the darkness is made by him breathing hits him hard for some reason. There isn't even the soft _tick tock_ of a clock, because everything these days seems to be digital. For an endless moment he wants to make some noise, something, anything. It passes. He squeezes his eyes shut tightly and balls his hands to fists until he can feel his nails bite into the tender skin of his palms.  
When he opens his eyes the room is still in darkness. Velvet and creepy-comforting. The windows are shut and the curtains are closed. He closes the door to the bedroom and makes his way to the bed. The sheets feel cold like no one ever slept in them. The mattress makes a noise as he lies down. He knows without bothering to look at his cell that it's four a.m. now and that he'll be able to sleep in a few minutes.

 

~2~  
William rips through the man's throat like it's butter. The blood explodes on his tongue and for a second, maybe two, it's all he needs, all he'll ever need. It's a kind of satisfaction he never felt as a human being – or maybe he just doesn't remember. Maybe he doesn't want to remember.  
The kill is messy and unnecessary, on top of that. Emilia would scoff, but Emilia is from a whole other time period; she sometimes scoffs at cell phones too. William suspects she is slowly going mad like all vampires do with so much time between them and eternity.  
He sighs and wipes his mouth on his sleeve then leans against the wall. Too close to the corpse, but he just doesn't have enough in him tonight to care. He is seriously thinking about just sleeping here and cleaning up tomorrow when he doesn't feel so tired and freaking alone. He has no idea when he started feeling like this, like he is the only sane vampire around. He doesn't allow himself to pinpoint it and when he thinks about staying here, it can't be a sane decision.  
His body feels lethargic and that in itself should be alarming, but somehow it's not.  
What the hell, he thinks and curls up on the hardwood floor.

~+~  
William wakes to the sound of the alarm. He hits something as he tries to reach for it, swears and opens his eyes. Right, he thinks, this is not my apartment. I was stupid enough to just curl up on a dead stranger's floor and fall asleep. He looks around, finds the alarm, and he switches it off. Too freaking early to be up, but now that he is up, he can do something productive with his day. Like burning the house down. If he hadn't killed this man so viciously, he could've just covered up the bite-marks and be done with it. But no, he was having a fit. He was behaving like a freaking teenager and just took a random guy home, well, technically the guy took William home, but still. Fact remains: he was stupid and reckless and now he has to clean up this mess, because there is no one to clean it up for him. He looks at the clock: seven thirty. Right, Emilia is still in her coffin. Not that she _needs_ to sleep in one, she chooses to do it. She started some ten years ago. The one time he asked, she said she was feeling nostalgic. He didn't want to know anymore than that. It's better not to think about the past too much. It's the freaking past. Nothing can be done about the past – unless you are a time-traveller and there are no time-travellers. At least he believes there aren’t any. You can never know. Fifteen years ago, he didn't believe in vampires either and then BAM! He was one. Or that's how he tells it when someone asks. Up until now, only Emilia has. William still has no idea if asking such a personal question is good vampire etiquette. But maybe there isn't anything like vampire etiquette. No rule book either. It seems like you are changed and then left to sink or swim. The world is a savage one and why should it be any different for the creatures of the night? Nothing is ever easy and every species fights for survival.  
Now back to the task at hand, burning the evidence. He needs a clean get away. He is sure when they have to leave town again Emilia will have his head on a freaking silver platter.

~+~  
He's soaked to the skin when he enters their apartment. His feet make a funny sound on the floor. He strips his clothes on the way to the bathroom. They are ruined anyway. He'll have to throw them out. He can't hear her in the apartment, maybe she's up and hunting, or maybe she's up and shopping. Who the hell knows? It's not like she is his mom or girlfriend.  
The bathroom is sparkly clean. It looks like something out of a freaking commercial. Every time he uses it he has the urge to smash something to pieces or leave obscene graffiti on the tiles. He doesn't. He throws his socks out of the door into the hall and closes it behind him. A look in the mirror lets him know that there is blood on his skin too and in his hair. It's a wonder no one stopped him on the way back home and asked some uncomfortable questions. He turns the water on and steps into the tub. It's a morning for a bath, not a shower. Emilia left the window open and he can feel a soft breeze on his skin, hear the noises of an awaking city. Cars, birds, people ordering coffee. He can smell the coffee up here. The surprising thing was that he couldn't smell the blood. All the vampire fiction he used to read when he was a teenager always implied that vampires could smell the tempting blood rushing through the mortals veins. It's not true and when he finally had the guts to ask Emilia about it, she looked at him strangely for a second and then laughed. It turned out that the reason why they can't smell the blood in human veins is that if they could they would go insane. It would be like being in constant heat. It makes sense, he supposes. So, they're only left with a hunger that could drive them crazy if they didn’t give in from time to time. Some vampires like to kill for the thrill of killing of course, but Emilia says it's only the stupid ones and they are hunted down, by humans and her own kind alike. She says it like that too: her own kind. Like he isn't part of her kind somehow. Like he doesn't belong with her species.  
He closes his eyes. It's futile to think about it, she doesn't answer his questions most of the time and he has never seen another vampire other than her. He can't even remember the one that turned him. He tries, god knows he tries, but he was drunk at the time and it (he doesn't even know the freaking gender) came out of nowhere. The next thing he knows he has all the tell-tale signs of the bloodthirsty undead.  
When he gets out of the bathtub the water looks slightly pink and he feels tired as hell. He towels his too long hair, throws the towel into one corner and wanders over to his room, falls face first onto the sheets and blacks out immediately.

 

~3~  
She must be crazy- batshit crazy- to consider what she has been considering for 15 years now. True, a vampire has time if nothing else, but even for a vampire, 15 freaking years is a bit much. The thing is, Emilia thinks, she likes William. She likes him a lot. He reminds her of her youngest brother, who is long dead and gone. He reminds her of her long lost family. Maybe now he is family. Still if the others should ever find out that he even _exists_ and that she knew and didn't do anything about it, well.  
On the other hand, it's not like she made him. Someone made him that much is sure, and she has to keep him from making other vampires, as that is one of the rules. He has never been tempted, but who the hell knows how long that will last? He might fall in love one day and then...well, someone will have to do something drastic. And it will have to be her. Because there is no one else. No one knows about William and she will keep it that way, even if it kills her.  
She takes another sip of her coffee and swallows carefully. The taste explodes rich on her tongue, not like blood, because there is nothing in the world that could even compare to blood, but it's still perfection of some sorts.  
A Hunter sits a few tables away. He followed them here from Paris. She saw him at the train station and he's been following her since then. She didn't tell William. He would have killed him without a second thought and Emilia likes a bit of fun. She hasn’t seen a Hunter in a long time. Fifty years maybe. Well, not that long if you go by vampire standards and she kept mostly to herself the last 200 years. So no one bothered her – much. This guy doesn't even look like much of a Hunter. It's just something about his behaviour that makes her pay attention to every move he makes. Maybe it's because he does the same. Like she is an exotic, dangerous kind of animal. She is, no question there. She doesn't like to think about herself that way, but she can understand where he comes from. She takes another sip of her coffee and licks her lips, catches his gaze, the wide eyed look, the desire in his eyes. She doesn't think he will be much fun. She sighs and flags a waitress down. She needs to get out of here so he can follow her and then maybe....maybe she'll kill him and be done with it, maybe she'll ask him what he wants first. She hopes he won't answer something stupid like: _your death, creature of the night_. It has happened before, a few times actually, when there were more of them and more Hunters as well.

~+~  
William is deeply asleep when she comes home. His clothes are in the hall; a trail leading to the bathroom. Sometimes he's like a child. She shakes her head and begins to strip. Her clothes aren't ruined like his, but she never keeps anything she was wearing when she killed a Hunter. Something about the smell is off-putting. Like their blood rots faster once the body is dead or something. Maybe Hunters are chosen by blood, like vampires? She mused about that earlier in her life, but not one of them lives long enough to tell their secrets.  
Sometimes she wishes they would just stop hunting her kind down. It's not like they are murdering at will. This is survival – in most cases. She bets William's last kill wasn't only about feeding, but he is different than her. Of course they are all different. Like humans, there are the good, the bad and the ugly, so to speak. But William, well, he might be the last of his kind. And if someone else knew he existed, they would chase him down and kill him. Maybe even in something like a ritual. Not that Emilia is one for ritual sacrifice. Or ritual _anything_ really.  
She shakes her head. Hunters.

~+~  
The water is warm like the breeze of the afternoon. She can hear people outside, birds, cars under the bathroom window. He is like her, she thinks. He likes the same things. The soft breeze on his skin when he showers or takes a bath, the loud pounding music in a dark shady club, the rush of a good kill.  
She would miss him if he should get killed.

 

~4~  
William doesn't kill people outside of clubs in shady alleys. It's so cliché to do that, besides he doesn't like to be too close to other people when he does it. Feeding has always been something he liked to do in private. He never asked Emilia to join him, she never asked him either.  
He tried to stick to bad people, but it's not like he can smell them out. It would be cool to be able to do that, but if he's honest, he's a wolf amongst sheep. Humans are all the same to him. Some more interesting than others, but there was never anyone he thought he would let live for whatever reason.  
He doesn't always kill the people he goes home with, sometimes he just wants to fuck or be fucked. The hunger isn't and never was something that gnaws on his insides every night. He is thankful for that. Usually he can predict from the morning when he wakes up what kind of night it will be, but then there are nights, days, he can't. Tonight is one of these nights.

“You're going out to fuck or kill?” she asks, putting her knitting aside.

He shrugs, puts the eye-pencil down and turns to look at her. “I have no idea yet. It's one of those nights.”

“Aha,” she answers staring at him. Sometimes he is absolutely sure she has secrets. Important things he should know. Sometimes he thinks she is batshit crazy, on other days he thinks she lets him only think that.

“There was a rotten smell when I woke up,” he says, because he wanted to ask her about it, but somehow forgot.

“When?”

“Last Wednesday,” he answers.

“Oh, yes. I killed the Hunter that followed us from Paris,” she replies and takes her knitting needles into her hands again.

“Okay...and you didn't think to tell me about it, because?”

“Is that a real question?”

“Sometimes I wonder how lucid you really are, Emilia,” He shakes his head and she smiles at him predatory, slow and then licks her lips. He is at her side in a flash. The knitting needles fall with a sound to the floor as her clothes are ripped from her body. He presses her into the couch, her mouth against his neck feels hot and sharp. He can feel her heart beating faster, they're so close.

“Just do it fast and hard, please,” she whispers against his skin. He nods. As if he could do anything else. She slings her legs around his middle to pull him closer. She seems so much more powerful in these moments when she demands things from him, even when she says 'please' he has the feeling that she doesn't really mean it. William gets undressed enough to be able to push into her in one smooth thrust. It's so forceful that it pushes her deeper into the couch. He is sure their neighbours can hear them. The couch makes a sound with every thrust he makes. Her fingernails dig into his skin, leaving bruises and shallow cuts that don't last beyond the second of sharp pain-pleasure. She bites at the tender spot where neck meets shoulder when she comes and her grip is nearly crushing his bones, but he doesn't stop. Her mouth on his skin feels hot and wet, but he knows it's only saliva and not blood. She has never bitten him, not once and he doesn't draw her blood either. He lets her steal his moans away with her soft lips, because she always can sense when he's about to come and then falls on top of her. Emilia strokes his sweaty hair for a few minutes before she kisses his cheek. “You have fun tonight,” she whispers and he laughs into her neck.  
Since he met her, his life is even more absurd than it was after he was turned into a freaking vampire, but at least he is not alone, even if she is a little crazy.

“Will do,” he answers, kissing her once on soft lips, getting up and straightening his clothes out.

“Take a shower first,” she says, grabbing her knitting needles, not bothering with her clothes. He shakes his head, she brushes her long dark hair out of her face and ignores him.  
Well, he thinks, that's all for tonight. That's how it is living with her. Unexpected sex and a lot of secrets. Blood, travel, hotels, strangers and always her in the end. He would miss her if she decided this life isn't for her anymore.

~+~  
It's two in the morning and he is not in bed. He is in a club somewhere, nowhere. In the end, clubs are kind of all the same everywhere. The design might change, the style of the people, the crowd might be different, but people are just people and all of them want the same thing in the end. Dance, get drunk, get laid. One of them, all of them.  
Andrej doesn't want any of it – not anymore. Maybe not even to begin with. He came because everyone did. That's the truth. Or maybe he came so he wouldn't be sitting on his balcony around four o’clock in the fucking morning again. This is always a possibility as well. Maybe he came because Tom made that face again.  
Someone knocks into him and he spills his drink on the guy sitting beside him at the bar. The guy turns around angrily, but his face softens into a smile as soon as he sees Andrej. Great, he thinks and he smiles. He isn't in the mood to deal with strangers who want to take him home, because they think he's a girl. He mouths sorry and gets up. The guy grabs his arm and he turns around a bit pissed off. Why do people think it's okay to grab a total stranger just because they're in a club and it's semi- dark and loud? Private space bubble is still private space bubble.

“Not interested,” he shouts.

“You don't even know what I'm proposing!”

Andrej would roll his eyes at that, but even rolling his eye is too much effort for this idiot. “And I'm not a girl!”

The guy looks a bit confused. “What?”

Andrej grabs his hand and puts it on his chest there where a breast should be. “Not a girl,” he repeats.

“Oh...sorry?” the guys says sheepishly and before he can decide that he really doesn't care for his heterosexuality as long as he can have a piece of Andrej's ass, Andrej disappears from the bar. And the club as well.  
His friends won't miss him much judging by the alcohol that was consumed already and he needs to get out of here. He needs to be somewhere he can fucking breathe.

~+~  
There is a park a few blocks from his apartment. If he gets out of the taxi earlier he could just sit on a bench in the dark, smoke a cigarette and stare at the endless sky.  
There are a lot of people who are creeped out by parks during the dark hours of the night. Andrej doesn't belong to that group. He was raised right. He isn't afraid of the dark. At least not like other people are. He doesn't take stupid risks, he is wearing his locket with the small hex-bag inside. Grandma always said better safe than sorry and there are things that go bump in the night. If you are prepared you don't need to fear the dark. He lets the taxi stop at the entrance to the park.

“You sure?” the driver asks.

He smiles. “I'm sure.”

The driver shrugs. “Be careful, there are freaks out there that would love to get a pretty girl alone.”

Andrej hands the money over and gets out. “I'm always careful,” he answers.

With the first step on the grass he feels like he can breathe again. He finds a bench under a street-lamp, sits down and lights a cigarette. He takes a deep drag, exhales slowly, takes another and takes off his shoes and socks.  
The night is warm and the breeze caresses his skin. He thinks he could stay here for a while. Maybe even until morning.

~+~  
First he thinks the wind picked up or something. His skin tingles with something that is not quite fear. It's a bit like anticipation.  
He hears a soft noise and looks into that direction, but he can't see anything that lies beyond the light of the street-lamp.

“So, this is pretty stupid, but I know that someone's there,” he says. He doesn't shout or get up and try to leave. If it's something or someone predatory trying to leave would only wake the instinct to leap and hunt. Kill even. He takes another drag of his cigarette and makes himself calmly wait.

“Yeah,” comes the answer eventually and a man steps out of the shadows.

“Oh, hi?”

“Hi,” he says, smiling and then sitting down next to Andrej. Andrej suppresses a shiver. Something about that man is a bit...off, somehow. He just can't put his finger on it.

“Cigarette?”

“No thanks,” the man says.  
Andrej shrugs and takes another drag. The man beside him stares at his profile for a while and then he looks up at the sky.

“So, you come here often?” Andrej asks, because he feels daring.

“Is this a line?”

Andrej shrugs, he isn't sure. He turns to look at the man. He is good looking, not like Andrej in a girly way. His face is soft and smooth, early twenties maybe, his hair seems a bit too long, but it suits the angles of his face. Makes them softer.  
“You shouldn't be here alone,” the man says.

“I'm here with you now,” Andrej answers.

The man laughs. “I'm William.”

“Andrej,” he says.

“That is a strange name for-”

“I'm not a girl,” he interrupts.

“I see.”

Andrej smiles. “But you really didn't, did you?”  


William laughs. “No, no I didn't.”

Andrej nods, takes a last drag of his cigarette and throws the butt on the grass by his feet.

“That's how fires start,” William says, crushing the still gleaming butt with his shoe.

Andrej turns to him, something about William's face, his body, maybe his voice or his lips he finds pleasing, intriguing maybe even. “Was that a line?”

William smiles and gets up. “You should go home.”

“What would I do there? I can't sleep. I can never sleep until four a.m.” It's the truth, but maybe, just maybe he wants this man to take him home.

William looks down on him. “You're a strange one.”

“I'm wearing girl's clothes,” Andrej answers, shrugging.

“I have no idea what that even means!” William says, smiling and then he bends down, slowly so that Andrej could lean away if he wanted to, but he doesn't, and kisses his cheek.

“See you around,” Andrej whispers into William's skin.

“I really hope you won't,” William answers, stepping away and disappearing into the shadows again.

~+~  
Later when he's in bed, tucked under his favourite comforter, he decides that it was the smell. Like something he half remembers from his childhood. Like burning wood and milk with honey and garlic; the smell of a lost childhood country. Only existing in his brain now. Half forgotten.

 

~5~  
There is something different about William when he comes home that night. Emilia can’t pinpoint it, but it’s something. She’s lived long enough now and she’s known him for 15 years, she knows these things.

“A night for fucking or feeding?” she asks as soon as he sits down with a mug of tea. He always liked tea better than coffee.

“Strangely enough, for conversation,” he says.

“Conversation?”

“Conversation,” he answers.

“You did not kill anyone, or fuck anyone, and had a conversation _before_ these events didn't happen?”

“No, I was going to feed, I think, or fuck, but I didn’t. I met this boy and we sat on a bench and talked.”

“A human boy,” she states.

“Of course, it seems like there are no other vampires besides us,” William replies with a frown.

“Trust me there are. They’re out there, like we are out here,” she says. It sounds all a bit foreboding and ominous. She knows he doesn’t like it when she’s being ‘mystical’, but she can’t help it. She just doesn’t want to be the one to have to break it down to him. In the end, she knows, there will be no one else to do it, but for now she thinks they still have time.

“Okay…”

“So, this boy?” she prompts.

“I don’t know. Just a boy. I have no idea why I didn’t do _something_ at least…”

“I assume he was pretty enough?”

“Like a girl, I thought he was a girl before he told me firmly that he wasn’t,” he answers, taking a sip of his tea.

“You want to see him again?” It’s always a possibility, vampires like to be entertained and someone who you don’t want to kill or fuck on the spot is some kind of entertainment.

He shrugs. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

“We’re staying as long as we want to,” she answers. She isn’t sure they can actually stay as long as they want to, because there are Hunters on their trail, but well… Nothing they can do about it now. Hunters have to show themselves before she can kill them.

~+~  
Andrej blows on his coffee and then takes a careful sip. The morning is already really warm, it will be a hot day. He doesn’t like hot days per se, sun doesn’t go well with his pale skin and sun block always leaves an unpleasant feeling. He curls into one corner of his sofa and stares out of the window. The cushion tickles the sensitive skin of his inner tights, but he is too lazy to find a new position to curl up. The conversation with William is playing in his head. He just can’t say why he was interested to stay there and talk to him when he wasn’t interested in the company of anyone else last night. Not even his friends.  
Weird.  
And the dreams about his grandmother, well, weird too. He feels well rested, but thinks that he shouldn’t. Feels like he should have been tossing and turning in bed, fighting for sleep. He hasn’t slept that well in months. It’s almost like he finally found what he was looking for without even knowing what it is, like he accomplished a task set out for him. He shakes his head. That is so stupid. There is nothing set out for him. No destiny. His mother told him, his mother keeps telling him when he remembers to call her, that he can do whatever he wants with his life and fuck all the rest. Well, maybe not the last part, but he is sure she means it that way.  
Lately, life became a bit dull, it’s not that he doesn’t like his job and it has a lot of advantages, but he doesn’t think this is what he wants to do for the rest of his life.

~+~  
William isn’t looking for Andrej when he sees him walking over at the farmers market. He is here because he wants to buy Emilia some flowers, but he sees Andrej immediately. His blond hair put into a messy bun at the nape of his neck. Sweat glistening over his lip. He is wearing long sleeves even when everyone else isn’t – except the children. He’s being subtly watching him and then Andrej looks in his direction like something alerted him to William’s presence. There is an irrational second of a fight or flight instinct, but he stomps on it. What the fuck? He is the freaking predator here. There isn’t much he has to fear, especially from a boy. A human boy. Andrej smiles and William smiles back.

“So…” he says as he’s in hearing distance, no that William couldn’t have heard him from where he stood, but Andrej doesn’t know that.

“Grocery shopping?” William asks falling into step with Andrej automatically. He usually gives the tempo, but he doesn’t mind walking at Andrej’s pace now.

“Yes, I’m making Cajun chicken, so I needed a few things,” Andrej answers.

“Like?”

“Everything except cream and Cajun spices,” he answers with a quick sideways look at William. There is a soft smile playing around his lips. They look girlish. It’s a bit like he can change genders at will. It’s fascinating.

“You’re not one for planning, hmm?”

“I woke up and wanted it, so I came out here to buy what I need,” Andrej shrugs.

“It’s a bit like being a vampire,” William says.

Andrej laughs. “Maybe? I wouldn’t know.”

It’s not dangerous to talk about what he is, because people long forgot that there are things in the dark that want to get them. Or they have really screwed romantic ideas about vampires. He doesn’t ever actually say he is a vampire, but that’s only because people would think he’s crazy and he doesn’t want to ruin his chances at getting laid or getting fed.  
They end up at a café, watching people pass by, sometimes too close for comfort and one time Andrej leans away as a man caress his arm passing by.

“That was creepy,” William comments.

“It happens,” Andrej answers, taking a sip of his latte. It’s served in a glass, because that’s that kind of place. William likes it and vows to bring Emilia here soon. William raises an eyebrow. “They think I’m a girl and apparently pretty girls are easy prey,” he elaborates.

“Prey,” William repeats. The word taking a delicious shape on his tongue.

Andrej smiles. “You wanted to ask for my number as well the first time we met.”

“I wanted to fuck you,” William hears himself answer. He isn’t actually sure he wanted that, he wanted _something_.

Andrej makes a face at him and William laughs. “You’re kind of crude, aren’t you?”

“I just don’t care much,” William admits, because it’s the truth.  
Andrej nods like he gets it. Maybe he does, William thinks, after all, he wears girl’s clothes in public and apparently likes to fuck with society’s gender norms.

~+~  
Emilia is knitting a scarf, even if it’s the middle of May, when he gets home. He puts the flowers on the table and makes some tea.

“Flowers, William? Are you cheating on me so soon?” she asks, her tone is light. He can hear the smile in her voice.

“As a matter of fact, yes,” he answers her from the kitchen.

“And here I thought you were one of the good men.”

“I’m a vampire,” he replies entering the living room with two mugs of herbal tea.

She makes a face at him. “I want coffee.”

“I’m taking you out tonight to a café with real china and glasses,” he answers.

She takes the offered mug. “Oh?”

“Yeah. Andrej showed it to me today.”

”Andrej, the human boy?”

“Yes. Am I hearing disapproval?”

“They die so easily, William,” she sighs. It’s not a threat, she’s only stating the facts.

“I know. I kill them to survive, but I like him and it’s not like I want to make him one of us or anything.”

She sets the mug on the table and grabs his wrist, looking at him. “You couldn’t even if you wanted to.”

“Why not?”

“We can’t make any human being what we are. They have to carry that gift inside them already. It’s like a latent mutation and when we bite, when we let them drink our blood, mingle theirs with ours then they change. The rest just die.”

“And how do we know who is carrying it?” William asks. This is the first time she tells him about these things.

“We just know. It’s like something inside us recognises it in them. A way nature has to make sure we don’t die out or something. Beats me why, but well… Nature produced other deadly creatures besides us and they all have a purpose.”

“You have no idea where we come from, do you?”

“We could be a fucked up version of X-Men, for all I know,” she states and takes another sip of her tea.

He nods. “There isn’t anyone left who knows, is there?”

“I don’t think so. We aren’t a cuddly bunch, exactly.”

“And still, here we are,” William answers with a smile.

“It’s because you’re special,” she says, smiling back, but something in her voice makes the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He wants to ask her, but she sets the mug aside and stands up. “Thank you for the flowers, they’re lovely.”  
He has known her long enough to know that this conversation is over.

 

~6~  
Andrej is bored out of his mind and he wishes he asked for William’s number so he could text him how bored he is. Well, nothing he can do about it now, except hope that they run into each other again.  
It’s his day off. There are more of them now that he can afford to say no to a shift. His dad’s money is helping a great deal. Andrej has no idea why his dad decided to give him money now, to acknowledge he has a son at all, but he doesn’t really care either. The money helps and that’s the only thing that counts.  
But the days are also dull, because he thinks that something is missing from his life. A nagging feeling at the back of his head. It’s like something needs to happen. He just doesn’t know what.  
He sighs and texts Tom instead.

~+~  
Sometimes William lets the hunger build until it makes him crazy with need. Until he’s so on edge that it’s not really pain anymore, but some kind of twisted pleasure. It’s playing with fire and Emilia never does it, but maybe she’s just smarter than him. Maybe it comes with age and in a few hundred years he won’t do it anymore either.

“Tonight is one of these nights, hmm?” she asks as she enters the apartment. There is blood on her lip, it looks a bit like smeared lipstick, or jam. He can’t look away from it. “Come on,” she says, reaching out to him. He takes her hand, grabs her neck to hold her still and licks the blood away. It tastes stale, but still good. He is starving and will do something drastic if he doesn’t feed soon. “You shouldn’t do this,” she says softly.

“But it feels so good when I can finally feed,” he answers.

She sighs. “It’s stupid and reckless.”

He feels anger surge up inside him and pushes her away, but not too hard. “I like it.”

“I know,” she sounds resigned.

“Don’t wait for me,” he says passing by her on the way to the door.  
She doesn’t answer.

~+~  
Andrej's a bit drunk and is on his way home from Tom’s birthday party when he notices it again. That smell. Stronger somehow. The smell means William’s close. The smell connects to his brain and screams at him.  
He looks around. Cars, people, a club close by, but he can’t make William out in all of it. He leans against a brick wall and lights a cigarette. Closes his eyes and tries to concentrate. It doesn’t help, the smell is there, but he can’t pinpoint is, he is too drunk. And he never tried to find anyone by scent alone. It’s kind of a stupid method. He smiles around his cigarette and then a noise startles him. He looks up and William is standing on the other side of the street. Andrej smiles, William smiles back. There is a dark stain on his shirt and he looks rumpled.  
Andrej takes a deep drag and then crosses the street.

“Fucked some girl in the ally?” he asks.

William smiles. “I thought you found it rude to say it like that?”

“There really isn’t another way to say it. It’s fast and hot and kind of cheap,” Andrej answers. The scent settles in his brain and begins to scream at him again. He has the feeling he should run or chase something, but he stomps on it and takes another drag of his cigarette.

“It was not that fast, but I give you the hot and cheap,” William answers. “Can I have a drag?”

“Sure,” Andrej says, handing his cigarette over. “You can keep it.”

“On your way to a club for some fun?”

“On my way home, actually,” Andrej replies and then takes out his phone. “Give me your number. I was bored out of my mind the day before yesterday and wanted to text you just how bored I was and I couldn’t.”

William takes the offered phone and types his number into it. “Here.”  
Their fingers brush and Andrej has the stupid urge to kick, to run, to jerk away. He stomps on that as well. What the hell?

“Thanks, so you’re on your way home?” he wants to know.

“Yes…I am.”

“You could come home with me,” Andrej says.

“You’re drunk, but you can text me drunkenly when you want.”

Andrej grins. “I will,” he says, lights another cigarette and starts walking home. Strange. He was sure William would want to go home with him. He was so sure.

~+~  
Emilia is having hot chocolate for breakfast when he stumbles into the kitchen the next day.

“You look better,” she remarks.

“I feel better.”

She smiles. It looks kind of feral, savage. She looks, that morning, like the vampire she is, a dark creature of the night.  
He makes himself some tea and sits down next to her, her leg chilly against his own. He likes her constant chilly body temperature. His own is normal, nearly human. The cold comes with age, she said once. “I met Andrej on my way back home,” he says.

She lifts an eyebrow. “You just met him. You always seem to just run into each other.”

“It’s not that big of a town,” he answers. Something about her tone angers him.

“No, it isn’t. Still. I think I would like to meet him too,” she says.

William bites his lip and then nods shortly. “Fine.” There is nothing he has to be ashamed of.

~+~  
“Hi William,” Andrej says, yawning. It’s still pretty early. He slings the comforter tighter around his naked body and stares at the wall.

“Hi, so listen my friend Emilia would like to meet you?”

“Oh…yeah sure, I guess? Is she like…” he stops and bites his lip. He has no idea what he wanted to ask to begin with anyway.

“Andrej?”

“Yeah, I’m here. I have work today, but I can meet you guys for lunch? At that small café we were last time?”

“Sure, give me a time, we’ll be there.”  
Andrej does and hangs up.

~+~  
Emilia is tall and dark skinned with pretty hair and curves in all the right places. That’s what a Nubian princess would look like, he thinks. He takes her hand and the smell, not exactly the same smell, but pretty close to the one he identifies as William’s, hits him. He nearly jerks his hand away again and is sure she noticed, but she smiles at him anyway.  
She orders for herself and for William. It’s not a display of power, it’s just routine, he realises.

“So, you’re Andrej?” she says, taking a sip of her coffee.

“Yes,” he feels like he needs to sit straighter in her presence, like he needs to be on guard with her.

“And you and William keep running into each other?”

“Seems so,” he answers, he can’t explain it either. And he is not going to tell them that he can smell William. It’s creepy and unnatural.

She smiles into her cup and William rolls his eyes at her. It seems to Andrej like they’ve known each other for a very long time. He wants to ask, but in the end he doesn’t. They chat his lunch break away and then William kisses his cheek when they part ways.  
He still has the feeling that he needs to do something. Something important, but it’s dull now. A nagging edge, like the insomnia that hits him around two a.m.

~+~  
“You satisfied now?” he asks, falling onto the couch.

“Not sure, yet.”  
He looks up at her. She looks gorgeous. He has never seen another vampire, but he is sure there can’t be one more beautiful than her. Andrej would’ve been maybe one, but he doesn’t carry the gene. That mutant thing that would make him immortal forever.

“Why? He's just a human boy I like to hang around with, he can't be turned into a vampire. He's harmless.”

“It's strange that he can find you.”

“He can't find me. We keep running into each other,” he stresses.  
She gives him a look. It's the - 'I'm older and you should listen to me if you want to stay alive' – look.

He doesn't like that one. “We'll see,” she says and then strips.  
He could never resist her. Never. It's just that simple. She might be old and crazy and scary sometimes, but she's also beautiful, charming and he knows she cares about him.

“You want to have sex now?”

“He is pretty,” she answers as if that would explain why she's naked right now. He nods, somehow it _does_ make sense.

“You’re pretty.”

“Gorgeous, you mean,” she answers and he laughs, grabbing her hand and pulling her against him. She’s pliant and soft in his arms. That means this will be long and languid and intense.

“Gorgeous,” he whispers against her lips, just before he kisses her.

 

~7~  
If Andrej were any other person, or if he wasn’t born to Eastern European parents, he would just let this go, ignore all the small weird things that are happening to him, but he is not any other person. He is an Eastern European child and he knows about magic and evil that isn’t human. There is something wrong with him, he knows it. He doesn’t think it’s in a bad way, so maybe wrong isn’t the word. Maybe it’s strange or different.

“You’re brooding,” Tom says. He lights a cigarette and hands it over to Andrej.

“I guess. Thanks,” He takes a deep drag, the calming effect is instantly there. He wishes he could find something other than cigarettes. Poisoning your body just can’t be called smart.

“Wanna tell me?”

“I met this guy,” Andrej says.

Tom makes a face. He is alright as friends go, but he’s male. Andrej gives him a look. “Should I find Lisa?”

“No, man, go on. I am a 21st century man. I can handle a bit of boy trouble,” Tom says, exhaling.

“And Lisa would give you shit for it,” Andrej grins.

“She would. Okay, so you met this guy?”

“Yeah,” Andrej answers and then tells Tom all about William which isn’t all that much. He doesn’t even know his last name or where he lives. He leaves out the fact that he can smell him and his friend Emilia.

“That Emilia girl? She his girlfriend?” Tom asks, exhaling smoke.

“No idea. Maybe? I didn’t ask. But he wanted to…” he waves his hand.

“Fuck you. Yeah, I know that feeling,” Tom says and Andrej laughs.

“I am so sorry I was born a boy,” he answers.

“No sorrier than me,” Tom grins. “So, you like him?”

“Does it make sense when I say I need to be where he is?” Andrej asks, because it feels that way. It feels like he needs to know where William is at all times.

“You’re head over heels, hmm?”

Andrej shakes his head. “I have no idea.”

“I’m telling you what I tell all my friends: Go for it. The worst that could happen is a break-up in the end.”

“He could be a psycho killer,” Andrej counters.

“So could you,” Tom says.

“But I’m not.”

“I have only your word for it. And I bet every psycho killer says they’re not a psycho killer.”

“I’m going to consider your advice,” Andrej answers.

“You’re going to ask Lisa, hmm?”

“Yes.”

~+~  
Andrej is a nagging feeling at the back of Emilia’s head. It’s not unlike when she first met William. He might be the last male vampire left on earth, but he doesn’t know that. And except for her, he doesn’t seem to care much for other vampires anyway. She has no idea how someone could have made a male vampire 15 years ago. The ruling was out by then. Everyone knew about it. The stupid rule has been out since the late 1840’s, for god’s sake. Maybe, she thinks, it was another male vampire? Maybe they didn’t get them all. They were hunted down for their greed and stupidity and malice. They had it coming and she isn’t especially sad that Bryan is dead or any of his ‘brothers’. He was a tyrant. But William is different. He deserves a chance and it’s not his fault he is a vampire. He wasn’t asked. He was just turned. Emilia knows not every female vampire would kill him on sight, but most would. There were times she would’ve too. William is a boy without a clue and he doesn’t want to be the ruler of the world, or the king of the vampires, like most of the other males did. Just living didn’t seem enough for them and her kind was fed up with their shit. Maybe one day she will tell him about the revolution. All the bloody details. But not now. Now she has to think about Andrej and what the hell is wrong with him.

~+~  
Andrej doesn't call, but he texts a lot. Mostly when he's bored, or maybe he just pretends to be bored so he can text. William isn't sure and when he's honest he doesn't care much either. It's nice to have a friend besides Emilia. She is alright as friends go, but he has known her nearly as long as he has been a vampire now. It's not that she doesn't surprise him anymore, because she does, it's that he used to have a lot of friends when he was human.  
Hanging out with Andrej is easy.  
Sometimes there is this feeling to run or pounce, or kill, but it passes as soon as Andrej makes a stupid joke or comments on the movie they're watching.  
William isn't sure if Andrej is just special or if it's because he's not Emilia.

~+~  
They run into each other all the time. It's a bit creepy, but Andrej can't help it. It's true when he says, he _needs_ to know where William is at all times.  
It's like he has an inner compass that points him in William's direction every time. And when he's close, he lets his feet steer him there. They talk, they smoke, they laugh. Sometimes William's fingers brush his, his lips leave an invisible imprint on Andrej's cheek when they part.  
Maybe William is being careful and taking things slow, maybe something inside Andrej himself is being hesitant. That same something that lets him know where William is at all times and if he's close.  
He doesn't like to think too closely about it lately.

~+~  
William comes out of the bookstore and Andrej is there, leaning against a wall, smoking a cigarette.

He smiles. “Hi?”

“Hi,” Andrej answers, he sounds a bit sheepish.

“It’s a bit creepy how we always run into each other,” William says.

Andrej looks at him and then takes a deep breath. His hair is a messy ponytail, soft looking strands hanging into his face. The veins are messy roads under his pale skin. “It is creepy,” he confesses.

“What?”

“Can we talk?” Andrej asks.

William nods. “Sure.”

The start walking and William matches Andrej’s pace. Falls into step with him automatically.

“So…” Andrej begins.

“I’m listening.”

“This might sound crazy, okay? And I get it if you think that I am a nutcase and never want to talk to me again.”

“I’m so listening!” William answers with a smile he hopes is reassuring.

“The reason why we run into each other is that I know where you are, because I can smell you.”

William stops on the pavement and makes Andrej stop and face him. “What?”

“I can’t explain it, okay? I just can smell you. You smell different than other people to me.”

“Are you a werewolf?” William asks intrigued.

“What? NO! That’s absurd!”

“Is it?” William asks, cocking his head. People are giving them dirty looks because they’re standing in the middle of the sidewalk talking. Only jerks do that. “You just told me you could hunt me down by smell-” he stops and looks at Andrej.

“What?” Andrej asks.

“Nothing, just you can hunt me down by smell?”

“I guess, if you want to put it that way?”

“Is there another way to put it?”

“I don’t know, okay? I just need to be where you are, I need to know where you are, I…” he grabs the hem of his shirt and wrings it between his hands. “This sounds so bad and creepy,” he adds in a small voice.

“Yeah,” William says and it’s even worse if it’s what he thinks it is. Emilia didn’t tell him much about other creatures, but he’s sure they’re out there and he has no idea what Andrej is. Andrej bites his lip and William wants to hug him: he looks small and lost. “Hey, it’s creepy, but whatever…” he says softly, reaching out and pulling Andrej into a hug. Andrej is rigid for a few seconds in his arms before he nestles against William.

“This is really messed up and I’m sorry I am that way,” Andrej whispers.

“Hey, no. It’s not like you had a choice, is it?”

“Born that way, I guess,” Andrej replies, pulling away.

“Well, look at it this way: If I should ever need help you’ll always know where I am,” William says, letting go of Andrej.

Andrej laughs. “I’m not a hero, not much help. Look at me?”

“I think you’re perfect,” William says and he means it.

Andrej blushes. “I bet you tell that to all the pretty girls.”

~+~  
“We need to talk,” William says and she gives him a look. He rolls his eyes at her. “It’s important vampire shit, okay?”

“Okay,” she says amused.

“What do you know about Hunters?” he asks.

She cocks her head. “Not much. They hunt us, they have ways to find out where and what we are. Not one of them lived long enough to tell me or any other vampire anything.”

“And what do you think?”

“What do you mean?” she asks, she has a suspicion he doesn’t ask just for the fun of it.

“What are your theories?”

“I think they are trained,” she says carefully.

“Aha… and?”

“And maybe chosen like we are.”

“By blood?”

“Or something. Their blood smells rotten to us when we spill it and it’s poisonous.”

“Clever.”

“Nature doesn’t produce just predators, it produces an antidote to them as well. They are our poison. There to maintain a balance.”

“You don’t hate them.”

“No. I don’t. They were needed before the revolution,” she says.

“What revolution?”

“The vampire revolution. I need to tell you about it someday.”

“Not today,” he says a bit frustrated.

“Not today. So why are you asking?”

“I think I found one.”

“You found one?”

“Or he found me.”

“Andrej,” she states.

“He doesn’t know who or what he is. He isn’t trained. He’s just a boy…”

“Who could kill you,” she cuts in.

“Not intentionally,” William says.

She rolls her eyes. “Maybe, but still. It would be better if you would give him up. He’s just a human boy anyway. He doesn’t last your lifetime, William.”

“I know that, okay? I know!”

“But you don’t care.” She sighs.

“I’ll be careful and he doesn’t want to kill me, he doesn’t even know what I am. He only cares for who I am.”

“It’s your funeral,” she answers.

He bites his lip until it bleeds. “Thank you.”

“I wish you wouldn’t say that.”

 

~8~  
So, Emilia thinks, not enough that she has a male vampire in her life (only a boy on top of that), no she has an untrained and potentially dangerous Hunter as a friend. Or something like a friend. They only met once, but she is sure William will make her like him. Andrej is pretty and she has a soft spot for pretty things.  
It’s not all bad. This could be actually good for her and William, having a Hunter as a friend. Trained or not.

~+~  
She is right of course. He makes her drink coffee with Andrej and he is charming and cute and she does like him. She doesn’t want to, but it never worked that way. She has a soft heart for a vampire who fought in a freaking revolution and a dozen other wars, against humans and dark creatures of the night alike.  
She blames it on William’s presence or the fact that times change.  
There are Hunter families out there that don’t care anymore. They want their children to live a happy life, not a life of a chosen one. She always saw it more as a curse and is sure a few Hunters did as well. There is no way someone in the family doesn’t know about it. They are Hunters. They have connections and journals and chronicles. Like her kind does. Her own journals are hidden away from William and maybe herself as well. She doesn’t like to dwell on the past and maybe it’s time for some new rules.  
There aren’t that many of her kind out there anyway. The females of her kind always chose wisely. The men were driven by hunger for power, so they wanted armies, or passion, so they wanted concubines.  
It’s not that they are monogamous, because they’re not, but they don’t turn people into vampires just for passion. She never met another female vampire that saw a girl and said: Well, I want to fuck her and don’t want to be careful, let’s make her a vampire.  
Her kind was hunted for that shit and rightly so. There were too many of them. Too many to live in peace and safety.  
Emilia hunted Bryan down herself and she didn’t feel anything other than satisfaction as she spilled his blood on his stupid, too expensive, useless and _ugly_ marble floor.  
Still, there are things she needs to do. Things William might not like at all. But that's because he doesn't know the whole story.  
On second thought, he wouldn't like it if he knew the whole story either. Hell, she doesn't like it herself.

~+~  
“So, you want to tell him what he is?” William asks. He's looming over her, but she refuses to get up. She doesn't care for that kind of shit.

“Yes. It will be safer for us all. If he should just so much as nick his finger and it gets into your system, and you know it fucking will, you’re dead. There is no cure for Hunter blood. That’s why we kill them with knifes and bullets and not with our fangs.”

“There is something you’re not telling me.”

“There are a lot of things I’m not telling you,” she says dismissing it.

“Like vampire history?”

She shows her fangs, she is so fucking irritated right now. “Yes, yes! Like that. But it’s not your concern now what happened 1846. Okay? What we are dealing here with is an untrained Hunter and even if we don’t care about killing him, someone, I’m freaking sure of it, will care about him. He _can_ find vampires by smell.”

“Okay, okay,” he says. His hands crossed over his chest. He doesn’t like it, she knows, but neither does she. Her life is really kind of complicated right now.

“You need to tell him.”

“And what if he wants to know where that super crazy and secret information is from?”

“You tell him.”

“That I’m a vampire and we are sworn enemies?”

She nods. “Yes, though maybe you could use different phrasing.”

“Are you crazy?”

“He likes you, he’s not trained to hate and kill our kind and you aren’t either.”

“Well, yeah…”

“This is not a supernatural version of Romeo and Juliet.”

“I didn’t-” he begins.

“I know,” she interrupts him. “I know you like him and that’s okay, just don’t sleep with him, because just a freaking drop will kill you. Slowly and painfully.”

William closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. “He’s a weapon and you want to use him.”

“I want to protect you both,” she answers and is glad he doesn’t ask from what this time.

~+~  
“Okay...” Andrej says. Maybe he is crazy, maybe William is. He clutches at his mug and doesn't look at William's face.

“Okay?”

“It's not that I don't believe you, okay? My grandmother told me about the things that go bump in the night. I know there are things out there that aren't human and that they want to hurt us.”

“I am one of these things.”

“I'm not human either, apparently,” Andrej answers.

“No,” William says, grabbing for Andrej's hand and Andrej flinches away. He doesn't want to, it just happens, an instinct long forgotten kicking in again. William looks frustrated as he plants his hands firmly on the table. “No, you are a human being, just a special kind.”

“That can kill vampires. I'm a vampire Hunter,” he takes a careful sip of his tea and swallows. “Why are you even here?” he asks.

“Because Emilia thinks you need to know this.”

“I...” he begins and stops, he doesn't want to know these things. He doesn't want to be William's sworn enemy just because he was born with poisonous blood. But that's not what he meant. “That is not what I meant to ask. Why are you here with me when I can kill you? When even a drop of my blood can poison you?”

William runs a hand through his hair, frustrated. “Because I can't stay away.”

“Is it my doing? Am I bewitching to you, I mean vampires? Is it like with virgins and unicorns?”

William laughs. “There are no unicorns.”

Andrej gives him a look. “So all the bad things are out there, but the good aren't?”

“You are one of the good things,” William answers softly.

“I really don't feel it right now,” Andrej confesses. He sighs. “So where does that leave us?”

“We can still be friends,” William answers.

“This is some sick, celibate, horror version of Romeo and Juliet.”

“We aren't in love,” William answers.

Andrej laughs. “Speak for yourself.” Maybe he isn't in love, but he sure as hell was on his way there, maybe still is.

“What?”

“I haven’t taken anyone home since we met at the park,” Andrej says.

“That doesn't mean anything,” William replies.

“Not for you, obviously.”

“I can't, okay? I can't because I'll die if-”

“What?”

“See, when we kiss and I bite your lip too hard and just lick the blood, because it's in my nature, because it's in anyone's nature to do that, I'll be dead.”

“Every natural poison has an antidote.”

“You _are_ the antidote.”

And what can you say to that? Andrej grabs his mug harder. “So, you don’t want to see me again?”

“I do want to see you again, but Emilia thinks it would be better if we wouldn’t see each other in that way and I think she’s right. This is a disaster waiting to happen.”

~+~  
Maybe this is a disaster waiting to happen, but you can’t win anything if you don’t try, right? And he wants to try. He wants to make this work. Maybe if they never kiss at all, just do other things. What the hell is he even thinking? William is a vampire, and all his instincts should tell him to run and hide or kill. He’s a vegetarian for god’s sake, so killing is so not in his nature, except that it is apparently and isn’t that the greatest joke ever? William could live forever and Andrej could not. Wouldn’t even want to and besides there is no way a Hunter can carry the vampire gene. This whole thing is doomed.  
He takes a sip of his water bottle and looks into the night. At least he knows what is wrong with him. Grandmother should have told him that he’s from a vampire hunting family. Not that it would’ve helped much now, but it would have been nice to know. Instead vampires had to tell him. Talk about irony again.  
And what is he going to do with that knowledge now? It’s not like he can sit in the freaking park and wait for someone to bite him. He’s useless as a Hunter, untrained and clueless. He guesses they could just fill his blood into small bottles and throw them or something. Maybe he just needs to stop thinking about how freaking poisonous his blood is. Besides it only can kill vampires anyway and he doesn’t know any vampires he wants to see dead.  
Stupid, pointless musing.

~+~  
“You’re moping,” Emilia says.

“I’m not moping. I’m brooding, maybe.”

“About Andrej.”

“Not exclusively, you know. I am also concerned about all the stuff I don’t know about vampires.”

“You want a history lesson?”

“I think now that we are friends with a Hunter and you want to use him against someone, yes, I think it’s freaking time.”

She sighs. “Sit down.”

He crosses his arms over his chest, but sits down anyway. “I’m listening.”

“I’m making this short, so you don’t get bored.”

“Ha, ha.”

“1846 was the year of the vampire revolution, you can read it in my journal, because I don’t think you’ll ever see the chronicles. Basically, the revolution was about killing all male vampires, because they became stupid, power hungry and ruthless. What it comes down to, William, is that we, the females, didn’t want to die just because some stupid guy couldn’t keep his dick in his pants. We were hunted the years before more viciously than ever and we had enough. The male arrogance was at its peak and well, we killed them all. Hunted them down over the centuries and scattered their ashes. There is a ruling that forbids the making of male vampires for any reason.”

“But, I am a male vampire.”

“Yes you are.”

“So someone violated the ruling to make me?”

“Seems so. You don’t know who made you, so…no help there.”

“But,” he bites his lip and she waits for him to ask the question. “But what happens to male vampires that were made after the ruling passed?”

“It’s a rule to kill them all.”

“You didn’t kill me.”

“I was thinking about it, but I like pretty things and you, William, are a beautiful vampire.”

He laughs. “Good to know that you aren’t shallow at all.”

“Good thing I am shallow, pretty boy,” she answers with a smile.

“So, if they knew I was even alive, if they knew I existed, they would hunt me down, kill me, burn my body and scatter the ashes?”

“Yes, they would.”

“And you? What would happen to you?”

“I guess the same. After all, I found you, I didn’t report or kill you and I am sleeping with you…crimes piling up at my feet.”

“And now you have a weapon against them, whoever they might be.”

“Mostly our kind doesn’t care much. They want to live in peace and as I told you before there aren’t many of us left anyway. A few hundred all over the globe.”

“I can hear a ‘but’.”

“Because there is one. But there are a few vampires out there that fought in the great wars and the revolution and aren’t likely to let things go.”

“So when they find out I exist they will kill me.”

“They will try.”

“You are not going to let that happen,” he says, a bit surprised.

“Not if I can help it,” she answers and doesn’t tell him that she is willing to kill even her own kind to keep him alive.

“Thank you.”

“Whatever. You’re so lucky you’re pretty.”

“As is Andrej.”

She nods. “Yes, if he weren’t I would’ve killed him. He is a threat.”

“We broke up.”

“As if,” she says. He gives her a look. “I know you. You’re already looking for ways to get around it. And you watched _Pushing Daisies_ with an intensity that is kind of scary.”

“I’m not going to die if he touches me, you know?”

“You could never kiss.”

“Ned and Chuck kiss through cling film,” he counters.

“Yeah, it’s all very romantic.”

“Don’t be a sarcastic bitch now, please.”

“It’s not going to work.”

“It doesn’t have to be forever,” he counters.

She sighs. God, he’s so young and for the first time he’s in love and it is with a Hunter. How can that be her life? “I really wish things were different.”

“Yeah, tell me about it,” he answers.

 

~9~  
The thing is that he can’t stay away. Whatever it is that makes him a Hunter doesn’t let him not notice William and Emilia. It even gets stronger. Now that he knows their scent, knows whatever makes them vampires and so uniquely _them_.

“Hi,” he says a bit sheepishly.

Emilia looks up. “Sit down,” she says and he takes a seat opposite her. “Something to drink? My treat.”

“Sure,” he orders a coffee and looks everywhere but at her.

“You think I’m the evil witch in this little play, don’t you?”

“I know you aren’t. I know you care about him, but I care about him too.”

“Did you watch _Pushing Daisies_?” she asks out of the blue.

“Uhm, yeah?”

“Do you think it’s romantic that Ned and Chuck had to kiss through cling film?”

“I think it’s tragic,” he answers.

She nods. “And you still want to find a way around this whole thing.”

“It’s a curse.”

“Oh please,” she says. She can look seriously bitchy for such a pretty woman, he thinks. “It’s life. And you cannot be together. He’ll live forever and you won’t and even a kiss could kill him.”

“I can’t stay away,” he answers.

“Well, then we will. It’s dangerous for you to be with us anyway. If others of my kind should find out what you are, they’ll kill you on principal. It doesn’t matter that you aren’t trained; it’s enough that you have the power to kill them. There aren’t many of us left and we’re not the cuddliest bunch either.”

He crosses his arms over his chest. He doesn’t want to hear all these things from her. “I don’t want you to,” he says.

She sighs. “We aren’t crazy about moving again either, but you have to understand that it’s the best for all of us, Andrej. You’re so young and your life shouldn’t revolve about William, or us, or when something will crawl out of the shadows to kill you.”  
He nods, once. There is nothing he can do about it.

~+~  
“So, we’re moving,” William says.

“I know,” Andrej answers, his voice sounds small. “I met Emilia the other day.”

“I’m sorry…I-” he cuts himself off, he has no idea what to say, really. After all, there is nothing to say. Emilia is right. Andrej doesn’t belong with them. He’s only nineteen, a human and a Hunter; a disaster waiting to happen.

“It’s okay, whatever. It’s not like I’m the only person who can’t get laid because he’ll kill the guy right?”

“It doesn’t happen that often,” William answers with a soft laugh. He would have liked to see Andrej one more time, but it would only hurt Andrej more. “Don’t try to find us, okay?”

“I don’t think this thing works when you’re in another country or on another continent, you know?” Andrej answers.

“Bye,” William says.

“Bye, William,” Andrej answers softly.

~+~  
He puts his phone on the table as he grabs his bag on the way out. The apartment is all cleared out. Nothing left here except ghosts, he thinks.

“I thought you wanted to use him?” He asks in the taxi to the train station.

“I did, but he is too cute and I don’t want to get him killed, you know. It would make you a very sad panda, wouldn’t it?”

He smiles at her. “It would.”

“You’ll get over it, William. There are adventures waiting for us. And we have all the time in the world.”

“There aren’t any killers on my trail, are there, Emilia?”

“None I know about,” she answers.

“That doesn’t mean no,” he says.

“No, it doesn’t, but don’t you fear. I can protect you from whoever wants your bones and ashes,” she throws a smile his ways.

He really isn’t sure if he feels safer with her, but he likes her, so… Well, he’ll stay for another 10 years or something. After all she was the one who found him after he was turned. A fledging, not even four months old and she took him in. God only knows what she did to keep him alive since then. As vampire childhoods go, his was pretty awesome and it’s thanks to her.

~+~  
Andrej is sulking and he knows it.

“Okay, you need to get drunk.”

“It’s just so unfair. I can’t even get laid because-” he bites his lip and Tom makes a face.

“No details, please,” he takes a sip of his beer.

“There are no details. There were fleeting kisses on my cheek and brushes of fingers and his hands in my hair, that is all…I am-”

“Freaking frustrated,” Tom supplies helpfully.

“Yes, that.” Andrej admits.

“You’ll get over it. He’s not your soulmate, you know.”

“How should I know that?”

“Because he’s gone and soulmates never die.”

“You’re seriously quoting Placebo?”

“Yes,” Tom nods for emphasis. “Point still stands. He’s gone and if he were… If you guys were meant to be, he wouldn’t have given up so easily.”  
Andrej wants to defend William here, but in his heart he thinks Tom’s right. William gave up and because William did, Andrej is bound to do the same.

“Life sucks,” Andrej declares.

“I’ll drink to that.”


	2. Here without you

**Part II  
Here without you**

~1~  
There are days you just don’t want to get up. Today, Andrej decides is one of those days. But then, yesterday was one of these days too and the day before that and the one before. In fact, all the days since William left. William’s absence is a dull ache in his bones.

“You need to get up right the fuck now!” Tom says from the door.   
Andrej doesn’t even turn around to look at him. It was a bad idea to give Tom a key for emergencies. This is not an emergency, he has no business using it.

“Go away,” he mumbles.

“We have rehearsal in two hours, Andrej!”

“I don’t care. What difference does it make anyway?”

Tom sighs. “I know you are heartbroken over this guy, okay, I get it, but you can’t throw away your life because one guy didn’t want you.”

“He wanted me,” Andrej says stubbornly, because it’s the truth and the only thing right now that gives him some sort of comfort.

“Whatever. He’s gone and you are still here and you need to decide if he’s important enough to screw your life over him,” This is Tom’s no nonsense voice. He uses it with his sisters as well. And his sisters are 13.

“Rehearsal?” he asks.

“Yes, you know for the freaking play? Are you an actor or not?”

“I’m trying to be one. They didn’t give me my certificate yet.”

“And they’re not going to give you one if you’re never there. It doesn’t matter that you’re pretty or talented, you need to show up to class and rehearsals as well. And your job.”

Andrej turns to look at him then. “Did you at least bring me coffee and a bun?”

“Cinnamon and you’re welcome,” Tom says throwing a small bag at the bed.

“I need to shower,” Andrej answers.

“God, yes, you really do.”

~+~  
So, life goes on and he may or may not be listening to that song on repeat when he’s feeling like he wants to get on the next train to…somewhere, nowhere, wherever William might be. Andrej is actually glad Tom doesn’t take any shit and isn’t too sympathetic about this whole thing. Not like the girls are, who love a tragic love-story. Not that anyone actually knows all the freaking details of it. How could he tell his friends about vampires and Hunters? And vampires are not romantic. They aren’t vegetarians and don’t plan on becoming them either. William kills people and Emilia does as well. She said it herself: they are not a cuddly bunch.   
He goes to his classes, he shows up to rehearsals and his shifts and tries not to think about William or where he might be now, what he might be doing and with whom. The _with whom_ part is especially difficult to master.   
Sometimes he lies in bed and imagines a hotel in Eastern Europe, one of the big old ones. All blue velvet and gold, heavy frames, cherry wood furniture. He thinks about William being there, being there alone, getting ready for a night out. Imagines him getting home all bloody, or maybe he just takes someone home on that night, to fuck, not to kill. Those are the hardest to think about. It’s twisted and wrong to be thinking that at all. Because the hardest to think about should be the murders, but he glosses over them in his mind.   
Andrej never saw William naked, but he can imagine it anyway. He tries not to, because it’s some kind of torture to do it, but sometimes he can’t help himself. He knows William’s skin is smooth and pale, not unhealthy and even a bit darker than his own skin is. His hair is soft, he knows it from grabbing it once as it got tangled in his necklace. His lips are dry, usually. Andrej doesn’t know how they feel when William has just fed. Maybe slick with blood. Probably slick with blood. It should be a turn off, but it’s not, maybe because he is too obsessed already, too deep into this whole thing.   
On some nights, when he lies there imaging them together, tangled limbs and hot mouths, skin sliding against skin, he touches himself as well. His fingertips wandering over his ribs, the hollows between the bones, over his skin, the curve of his hipbone. He thinks about William’s hands and his lips, his voice, his words, his breath against Andrej’s body. Heated flesh on heated flesh.   
He stops when he reaches his dick, it’s just not the same.

~+~  
“We’re going out!” Lisa declares.

Andrej gives her a look over his salad. “We are?”

“You need to find some new love interest and the best way to do that is to go out and party, get drunk, get laid and maybe make the guy breakfast in the morning if he’s interesting enough-“

“Or kick him out,” Tom interrupts.

“Or that,” Lisa nods.

“This is a conspiracy,” Andrej states.

“No, dear, it’s an intervention.”

“Intervention?” Andrej scoffs.

“Yes, you are no fun at all, all brooding and moping.”

“Right,” he answers. It’s so typically them, he thinks, to go and try to fix it just because they can’t deal with someone who isn’t cheerful all the freaking time. He knows they mean well, but it angers him anyway.

“Don’t be grumpy, okay?” Lisa says. She hands him a muffin with little hearts on the icing and he sighs. They do mean well, he just doesn’t have to like it.

 

~2~  
Emilia knows that things will be different from now on. She told him about the vampire revolution and about him being the last of his kind. Things are bound to change. And it’s a good thing too. Stagnancy is boring as hell.   
Surprisingly enough he isn’t brooding or moping at all. She thinks he is trying to forget about it or maybe he is pondering his mysterious existence. To be honest, for a second here, she has been pondering it for years now. She is absolutely sure that no female vampire could have made him. Not even by accident.   
The one time she asked him if he was wearing a dress that night he gave her a look like she was crazy, which, yeah, but still. It could have explained a thing or two. Well, one: why the hell he was alive and kicking at all. He told her he never in his entire life wore a dress and he doesn’t plan on wearing one either. Not in the next two hundred years or so.   
She would have liked that explanation. Turned by accident. It happened before. Not often, true, but it happened and she can only go on what she knows about vampires. The past is nothing she likes to think about much, but it’s helpful sometimes.   
It’s not very helpful now.   
There are things she doesn’t like to consider at all. One of these things is that there are male vampires out there. Waiting, hiding, being worshipped by primitive humans in the jungle – or she should stop reading Anne Rice novels. They’re not accurate anyway. But the idea is somehow intriguing. Their kind was worshipped once as blood gods by humans and they liked it. She wasn’t born back then, but she heard stories about it. Mysterious tales about blood and gods and power. Lullabies for vampires.

~+~  
“You are taking this whole thing really well,” she says. She took up Ikebana as they settled in and is currently working on something in red and white. He has no idea what it’s supposed to be, but he is sure she’ll give her creation a colourful and meaningful name.

“Well, they’re just flowers. I don’t care much that they are everywhere,” he answers.

She gives him a look. “Not that.”

“The ones in the kitchen smell a bit rotten,” he says.

“Really?” she asks and then: “Don’t try to distract me, William. I mean serious business here.”

“I see,” he answers, leaning against the door-frame. His arms crossed over his chest. He doesn’t like it when she means serious business. Never came anything good out of it, in his opinion.

“I mean the whole Andrej thing,” she says.

“What about it? I can’t do shit to change the situation, Emilia. Should I be moping in a dirty little cemetery about the unfairness of it all? Would that make you happy?”

“Were you watching Interview with the Vampire again?” she asks, suspicion colouring her voice.

“No,” he replies, but what if he had? It’s not her business what he is doing when she’s arranging flowers in funny looking china vases. Everyone needs a hobby.

She sighs. “I wouldn’t be happy and you know it. I liked him too.”

“Well, nothing we can do about it. Born that way. No chance of changing a thing. Life goes on. I will find another shiny toy, blah, blah, blah, vampire business as usual.”

“I don’t like it when you’re being a sarcastic bitch, William.”

“I’m trying to deal, Emilia,” he says and doesn’t like how his voice sounds. It sounds like he means it, which he does, but he doesn’t like to be vulnerable in front of her.   
She puts the gardenia aside and looks at him. He just knows that any minute now she will hug him. He shakes his head.

“Fine,” she says. “I’ll let you deal. Go and find a new pretty boy to play with or a girl. I don’t care. Just don’t do anything crazy, okay?”

“You know me,” he answers with a grin.

She takes the gardenia in hand again and gives him a look. “Yes, I know you.”

~+~  
The truth is, it’s harder to deal with all this than he likes to admit. Not only is he in love with a Hunter, or on his way there (and now trying hard to fall out again), but he is the only male vampire alive as far as anyone knows. And in his case, that means him and Emilia, because no one else even knows he exists. Except for his maker. She must have thought about it too. For fifteen years now and he is sure she has some theories at least. She isn’t sharing them of course. Not with him or anyone else.   
Sometimes he would like to talk to another vampire. Now he knows that isn’t going to happen. If he wants to stay alive he has to stay away from them, has to stay away from any and all kind of vampire politics.   
He doesn’t think there is much vampire politics going on right now, after the revolution and all, but you can never be sure.   
William tries to remember his maker harder these days. Before he just didn’t care, because why should you care for someone who made you and abandoned you on the same freaking night? It was always obvious to William that his maker just didn’t care, or maybe that he or she made a mistake and was hoping for William to die. Now he isn’t so sure. He could still be a mistake, but he honestly doubts it and he knows that Emilia doesn’t think it either.   
His birth (or whatever) is a bit of a mystery and he really hopes it isn’t a plot to bring humanity down or some shit (maybe he reads too many comics and should stop watching bad horror movies as well). William isn’t ready to be a weapon, a disturbance, a saviour. He just wants to live forever and ever and ever. That’s enough time to find out what you want to be when you grow up and he is glad that he doesn’t need to be anything at all right now except himself.

 

~3~  
“So,” Tom says and gives him a long look.

“I’m over it,” Andrej declares and he believes it as well. It’s been two years since William left. He is 21 now and he is so over this whole vampire/Hunter shit.

“Are you?”

“I wrote a book,” Andrej says.

“A book?”

“Yes.”

“A love story?” Tom asks, the corners of his blue eyes crinkling. Andrej always liked his eyes a lot.

“No, a fantasy novel.”

“About?” Tom asks and it’s clear as day that he enjoys this like Andrej does. The back and forth of the conversation in short sentences makes it harder to think stuff through before you say it.

“Vampires.”

“Like Twilight, but gay?”

“Dude, Twilight _is_ gay,” Andrej answers amused.

Tom laughs. “So what is it about then?”

“Me and William. A love-story that could never be and never will and it’s all very tragic.” He nods for emphasis.

“Want me to proof read?”

“Sure.”

“Wait? Is there gay-sex?”   
Andrej gives him a long, and hopefully withering, look. “Never mind, I’ll read it anyway,” Tom says.

~+~  
So, Andrej wrote a fantasy novel that isn’t one. It’s a freaking biography with some creative additions. And completely devoid of sex. Lisa said that it would help to write it all down. She even gave him a notebook. Black with a skull on it, but he redecorated the whole thing purple. The black was just too depressing for his taste. He still has it, buried under a lot of other stuff in the drawer of his nightstand. When he reread it, it read as something tender and raw and beautiful but really depressing. He wrote the conversation down he had with William and ended it there. It was the end after all.   
And a new beginning of course for him and for William as well.   
Sometimes he still wonders what William is doing right now, but it’s fleeting, like the soft kisses to his cheeks by strangers.

~+~   
“You did what?” Andrej asks and wants to hit Tom really hard.

“I thought you would be thrilled!” Tom answers. He doesn’t get it. Of course he doesn’t get it.

“I am not!”

“They want to publish your book, Andrej!”

“This shit is private, I can’t just…” he runs a hand through his hair, it tangles in the long, pale strands and he winces.

“What? It’s not like you’re sharing secrets with the whole world.”   
The funny thing is, it is. He would be sharing vampire secrets with the whole world. He would be Louis – a traitor to his own race or whatever they are and not only his own race, but William’s as well.

“I can’t.”

“Andrej,” Tom stresses.

“I can’t. And that is the final word on that.”

“Think about it. I bet they would want you to rewrite the ending anyway.”

“To something happy?”

“Or less gay,” Tom says.

Andrej bites his lip. He would not, he could not, but it’s futile to think about it, because he is not going to let anyone publish his book.   
“Doesn’t matter. It’s not going to happen.”

Tom sighs. “Well, then write another one. One that isn’t that personnel.”

“They think I have talent?”

“It seems so,” Tom answers.

~+~  
Andrej never thought about a career as an author. He likes to act, likes that his gender isn’t much of a question to these people, because they like it, but maybe being an author would give him similar liberty?   
He likes to write. He loves it. It’s fun and no one wants anything from him. He can just do it. No director to tell him what to do, how to stand, or how his hair has to look like in the wind – or whatever. He loves the stage, but it’s not like the job pays well and it’s an uncertain one as well. Sure, his chances are a little bit better, as he’s convincing in male and female roles, but still. It could be something to make money with, without his name attached to it.   
He’s pondering the whole writing thing for a week before he starts on the second novel of his life.

~+~  
“They want you to rewrite the ending, again?” Tom asks.

“Well, yes. Why are you so surprised?”

“Because it’s a good ending,” Tom says.

Andrej smiles at him. “I think that too and Lisa flipped when she read the manuscript. She loves it so much.”

“Of course she does,” Tom answers. He takes a sip of coffee. They’re sitting inside, because the weather is really freaking cold for the middle of May. “You wrote a fantasy threesome novel in which the girls kill the only main male character.”

“It was the right thing to do,” Andrej answers.

“It was,” Tom says. “Don’t rewrite it. It would ruin everything.”

Andrej nods. “Looks like rain,” he says.

“You’re in one of your morbid moods, aren’t you?”

“Sometimes, I miss him,” he says. Sometimes I can feel them nearby, he thinks. Not William or Emilia, but twice he felt the presence of vampires and he didn’t look, didn’t acknowledge them at all. He values his life after all.

“I know,” Tom says. “All your stories have characters named William in them.”

Andrej looks at him and laughs. “It’s a pretty name.”

“Tom is a pretty name,” Tom answers.

“Maybe next time.”

“You’re going to kill me off anyway,” Tom replies, long suffering.

 

~4~  
William stumbles upon Andrej’s book in a small flat when a pretty redhead takes him home. She is all over him, and he is all over her, until the book falls with a soft noise from the bed it was lying on.   
He bends down to pick it up and his name catches his eye. He always liked to read about fictional people with his own name. It’s a bit like having a look into another universe.

“Oh, it’s brilliant!” redhead girl says, snatching it away and opening a page. “Listen! ‘The blood felt stale and wrong somehow in his mouth, but he could not pinpoint why. It never used to taste like that. It always tasted like honey, the remembered smell of hay and summer flowers. This here tasted rotten – and not in a good way. It wasn’t the sweet cloying taste of too much sugar or the damp scent of earth, it was something darker. Like a heart decomposing.’” She closes the page and looks at William.   
William stares at her. She is beautiful, young, her hair a mess around her thin shoulders and her eyes blazing with love. Love for the written word. Love for what she read aloud just a few second ago.

“What’s the title?” he asks. Suddenly he needs to know.

“Edges,” she answers, holding the book up so he can see the cover and then she shows him the back and there is a tiny picture of Andrej. He knew, of course, as he read the name, but he can’t even try to deny it now. Not at all.

“Edges,” he says softly. The word leaving something bittersweet and sharp on his tongue. He hasn’t thought about Andrej much in the last few years. He didn’t want to and Emilia just didn’t leave him any time to be brooding and gloomy. Between being everywhere and doing everything, Andrej slowly slipped from his mind. Now he’s back with full force. Here, of all the unexpected places. “It’s something he would do,” he hears himself saying.

She cocks her head, hair obscuring half her face. “You know him.”

“Yes.”

“Wanna talk about it?” she asks and how the hell did that happen? How could they go from hot, hot near sex to this? Whatever this is.

“No, not really.”

She nods. “Okay. You want some coffee?”

“Sure.”   
And that’s how he meets Petra.

~+~  
“I’m staying with Petra for a while,” he says into the phone and Emilia makes a noise. He isn’t sure she’s pleased or pissed off. She is stranger than she was last week.

“You wanna to fuck or eat her?”

“I want to sleep on her couch and read her books.”

“We have books here.”

“Emilia,” he says, his voice on the edge of angry. “I can’t stay with you right now.”

“Oh…you read his book,” she states.

“I- I didn’t read his book, but you did.”

“Yes. But now you _will_ read his book,” she answers.

“I’m hanging up now.”

“Okay.”

He puts the phone down slowly and with care, because if he slams it down it will break. He can feel Petra’s gaze on his back, waiting, assessing.

“You okay?”

“She knew,” he answers her like that would make anything clear for her. She doesn’t know. She can’t possibly understand.

“I’m going to make you more coffee,” she answers. Maybe she does understand, maybe betrayal feels the same everywhere.  
He can’t quite believe she didn’t tell him. He shouldn’t be surprised at all, he thinks, because she lied to him about him for fifteen years. Ever since they’ve met, she has kept secrets. He has no idea why he thought she would stop now.   
She only told him one secret, the biggest maybe, but that doesn’t mean anything. The bigger picture is that she is a secret keeper – she keeps her secrets and other people’s as well. God only knows what else she’s hiding. William does think that she has the best intentions all the freaking time, but that doesn’t make it easier right now.   
Petra touches his arm with two fingers softly and he takes a deep breath. He nearly forgot she was there at all. She hands him the coffee and he nods a thanks, taking a sip.

~+~  
He wakes up with her fingers tangled in his. Her skin feels warm and she smells good. Human, not as clean as he and Emilia smell. He realises that it’s the first time in years since he woke up next to someone and didn’t want to leave immediately, because the person was dead or he felt sated and just wanted to go back to Emilia. Sit with her and watch her do whatever she was into at the moment. Have tea, talk about his night.

Petra’s fingers tighten around his hand. “Morning,” she mumbles.

“Morning,” he answers.

“You want to make me coffee?”

“I’m a guest here,” he answers her with a smile. He just can’t help himself.

“Yeah, but…we didn’t even have sex. I only make people coffee in the morning when there was sex,” she states, yawning. “And I have to be in class soon-ish.”

“Okay, but my coffee is horrible,” he warns her, but doesn’t make a move to get up and out of bed.

“It’s okay, I have tea somewhere too,” she answers, letting go of his hand. She looks down at him as she sits up. He face soft with pillow marks on her cheek, her long hair a mess, falling over her breasts.

“I really want to have sex now,” he says.

She laughs. “Yeah, me too,” she answers, stroking a finger over his lips. It’s kind of strange, but it feels good to be passive about it once. “Sadly, it will have to wait. No time. I need to shower and no you can’t shower with me. It’s a myth that that saves time and water.” She grins and gets up, disappears in the bathroom.   
He lies there staring at her ceiling. At all the small cracks and stains there. He really doesn’t want to go back to his apartment.   
When she gets out of the shower he is nodding off again. “You can stay here,” he hears her say and mumbles his thanks.

~5~  
Five years after William left, Andrej is signing his third book at a small bookshop when he meets Lysander. He looks up and there he is, smiling shyly down at Andrej and Andrej thinks, maybe.   
They go out for coffee, because that is what people do if they’re not sure they want to go on a date.

“So, you are going out?” Lisa asks. She’s playing with her hair.

“Yes.”

“With Lysander again? By the way, I love his name,” Lisa answers.

Andrej smiles. “Yeah.”

“You like him,” she says.

“I do,” he answers, because it’s true. He likes Lysander, he is smart and funny and Andrej loves to talk with him about everything. “He’s not starstruck or anything, you know?”

She gives him a look. “I know. I like that you’re trying again.”

“Trying?”

“To be with someone,” she clarifies.

“I tried before; there was Luke and John and Matt,” Andrej says.

“You were sleeping with them, true, but you didn’t care,” Lisa answers.

“I-” he stops, maybe it’s true, maybe he didn’t care at all about them that much. Maybe he was only lonely and it was nice to have someone beside him.

She nods. “I don’t judge your behaviour, Andrej. I am just happy you found someone you care about.”

“Thanks.”

“Any time, honey.”

He makes a face. “Don’t call me that.”

“But you’re so sweet,” she answers with a grin.

~+~  
Andrej buries his head in the pillow to hide his moan and maybe his face, as well. Lysander knows everything about his body, how to touch, where to touch and with how much pressure. Andrej loves that. Loves that he doesn’t care much about his own nudity, that he doesn’t need to be careful with Lysander either.

“Hey, look at me?” Lysander whispers and Andrej shakes his head slightly. He can’t. He just can’t look right now. Lysander twists his finger and Andrej bites the pillow. He loves to have Lysander’s fingers inside him, even more than his cock, but he’s never going to tell Lysander that.

~+~  
“I found your manuscript,” Lysander says one morning.

“It’s not finished yet,” Andrej answers lazily. He didn’t have any coffee yet and he still feels tender from their lovemaking the last night.

“It looks finished to me,” Lysander answers.

Andrej’s head snaps in his direction. “You went through my stuff?” he asks sharply.

“Yeah. It’s a very interesting concept with the Hunters and stuff. A bit morbid,” Lysander has no clue how fucking angry Andrej is right now. It’s pretty clear. He doesn’t think he did anything wrong and maybe he didn’t. They’ve been together for over six months now. But Andrej is irrationally angry anyway.

“I don’t want you to look at it again,” he says, his tone sharp and icy.

“I... what?”

“It’s private. You had no right to read it.”

“I’m sorry,” Lysander answers. Andrej doesn’t think he looks sorry at all.

“Whatever.”

~+~  
“Why didn’t you publish it?” Lysander asks a few days later.

Andrej looks at him. “What?” This comes totally out of the blue. They’re watching a movie and having a quiet evening alone. Whatever it is, Andrej doesn’t think he wants to talk about it now.

“The book. The one you wrote in your notebook.”

“Because it’s private.”

“It’s about you and him,” Lysander says.

“About who?”

“William,” Lysander answers with a duh look.

“Yeah, it is,” Andrej admits.

“You always write about him,” he says.

“I loved him,” Andrej whispers.

“And he left you and you wrote about it and buried it in your drawer.”

“I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

“You still love him?”

“What does it matter? He’s gone. He’s not coming back, he’s-“ Andrej bites his lip. He wants to tell someone and he knows he can’t. He can only write about it. Tell the truth wrapped up in pretty lies.

“It does to you.”

”Are you jealous?” Andrej asks.

“I’m not jealous,” Lysander says, but he’s not looking at Andrej.

“Hey,” Andrej says softly, grabbing his hand. “You really don’t need to be. I wrote it when I was 19. _19_ and it’s long over. It was over before we could even start something.” _That’s how fires start._ William’s voice whispers in his head, unbidden. Sometimes it still crashes over him like waves.

“You didn’t sleep with him.” Lysander states.

“No.”

“Maybe you should have,” he answers, squeezing his hand.

“It doesn’t matter anymore.”

Lysander keeps quiet.

~+~  
“He just can’t seem to let it go now that he knows about the manuscript,” Andrej says. “And I hate to talk about it with him. I hate to talk about it with anyone.”

“I know, I remember that conversation,” Tom answers.

Andrej wishes he could see him. Phones are more a necessity than a comfort.

“Well, it’s still private and I still don’t want to see it out there.”

“You could rewrite it.”

“How the heck could I rewrite it? That’s my freaking life.”

“Was,” Tom says.

“I wish you weren’t in Peru right now.”

“I’m not in Peru, Andrej. I’m in Budapest.”

“Same difference. You are not here.”

“I’ll be back soon and in the meantime you can take your boy-trouble to Lisa.”

“I hope you get me something really cool from Peru…” Andrej replies with a grin.

“I can hear you grinning, bitch.”

“Careful with the pillow-talk. I bet your girlfriend would flip.”

“It’s not that she doesn’t like you Andrej.”

“It’s only that she doesn’t like me. I know. It’s because I’m way prettier than she is.”

“You’ll always be the prettiest boy I’ve ever met,” Tom says and Andrej just knows he rolls his eyes, but he also knows that Tom means it. “Talk to him about it.”

“He doesn’t listen. He wants to see it published, so it’ll be out of my system. His words not mine.”

“Maybe he’s right. Maybe you need to give it away.”

“Maybe I can just burn it in the backyard,” Andrej answers.

“If it helps.”

“I don’t love him anymore,” Andrej whispers.

“So you say,” Tom says quietly. “It’s ok if you do, you know.”

“Thanks.”

“Talk to you soon,” Tom answers and hangs up.   
Maybe Tom is right, maybe a piece of him will love William as long as he can, as long as he’s alive, but it’s not the whole. It’s just a part and he can deal with it. Lysander has to deal with it too.

~6~  
Of course he doesn’t stay at her place for days, he borrows her copy of Andrej’s book and takes it to a café. Has chai with cream and sugar and doesn’t much care about anything until he closes the book an hour later.   
So, Andrej wrote a book and it’s about him, but not about them. He was so sure that it would be about them. He stares at the cover and doesn’t know what to do. He wants to talk to Andrej, but they haven’t talked in years. In the beginning, the first few months, it was really hard not to just text Andrej stuff or mail him stupid pictures, write a postcard even. He did that once. He wrote it, but didn’t send it in the end. It would’ve been stupid and cruel on top of that. He isn’t stupid or cruel.   
It makes sense now that she didn’t tell him about the book, he thinks, but he still doesn’t like it.

~+~  
Emilia is sitting on the couch when he enters their apartment. She looks like she hasn’t moved in days. It’s a bit creepy to be honest. Sometimes she just doesn’t seem human at all. She _isn’t_. Of course she isn’t, but mostly she can pass for human. They can pass for human. Him maybe easier than her, because he isn’t even twenty years a vampire yet.

“You’re back,” she says. Her voice soft.

“Yeah.”

“And you read his book.”

He nods, leaning against the door-frame to the living room. “He didn’t write about me.”

“He did write about you,” she answers.

“I mean, he didn’t write about us. About the Hunter thing and you and…” he trails off, running a hand trough his hair. He feels frustrated with himself right now and with her and Andrej as well.

“That, right there? That’s why I didn’t tell you. It hurts you.”

“It doesn’t hurt me. You lying to me, that hurt me,” he answers a bit too sharply.   
She doesn’t even bat an eyelash. He supposes it’s because she has hundreds of years of experience dealing with people, vampires and humans and what else is out there. “Nothing can surprise you anymore, hmm?” he asks.

“You’re wrong. You surprised me, that I didn’t kill you, surprised me. Andrej surprised me as well.”

“Yeah?”

“You have no clue, do you?”

“About what?” he wants to know. She seems in a sharing mood today and he is so taking advantage of that.

“That I would have had to kill him if he said anything about you two? About the things he knows about vampires – I know you told him.”

“It would have been stupid. He would’ve been in danger too. From other vampires. I am sure you have a rule about not letting a Hunter live in that handy codex of yours.” His voice is edged with sarcasm.

“We do. And I am including you here as well. You are one of us.”

“I’m really not.”

“You belong to me and I’m like you. It doesn’t matter that you may be the last male vampire. Or the first in ages,” she waves a dark slender hand, dismissing his argument already.

“My race wants to see me dead.”

“They don’t even know you _exist_!”

“And how long can we keep that a secret?”

“As long as we have to. You haven’t made any vampires yet. You don’t seem to have any megalomaniac tendencies, so, maybe they’ll come around.”

“I’m not even twenty years a vampire! How can you be so sure I won’t get mad in my time?”

“No one can know that, William,” she says softly and he feels like an ass for even raising his voice. Sometimes he feels like she’s his freaking mom. “If it helps, I would kill you myself if you should show such tendencies.”

“The strange thing is that I feel better knowing that,” he answers her, surprised himself.

She smiles. “Our lives are a mess. I know that. You know that, but they’re our lives and no one is going to end them except us.” Her voice is firm.

“You would kill for me,” he says.

“Don’t sound so surprised, stupid boy. Of course I would,” she answers and doesn’t say what he knows: that she loves him.

~+~  
He had a rule at the beginning too, he made it in his first two weeks as a vampire. Rule number one: never get attached to a human being.   
There was this girl he liked and killed by accident. So, after that, the rule made a lot of sense and later it was just easier to not get involved with humans too much. He fucked, he fed and then kept to himself.   
Emilia told him it was a stupid rule. Of course he could make friends if he wanted to, he just had to keep the friendships shallow. No one is made to be alone. Not even vampires, she had said. He was glad she found him. Took him home and let him stay. He never felt alone with her, even in those weeks when she didn’t speak a word to him. Just glances over her coffee when he sat down and nodded.   
Of course in hindsight that behaviour makes sense. She was trying to decide if she would have to kill him, if it was worth to even try to make him a friend or something more. He was a boy without a fucking clue.   
He is sure there are still dangers out there he doesn’t know about. He isn’t so sure he really wants her to tell him.

 

~7~  
“The new book is about him too!” Lysander says, his voice sounds nasty and Andrej has a freaking headache. He can’t deal with this shit right now: he doesn’t want to deal with this shit right now.

“All my books are about him and you said it was okay,” he answers quietly.

“I know, but that was before.”

“Before what?” Andrej asks.

“Before us!” Lysander says frustrated.

Something clicks in his brain then. “You want me to write about you.”

Lysander takes a deep breath. “Not about me, about us.”

“I can’t. It doesn’t work like that. You are not my inspiration.”

As soon as he says it, he knows it was the wrong thing to say. Well, fuck. Not his freaking fault. It’s too early to have this conversation and he didn’t have coffee yet, and he has a monster headache.

“Not your inspiration,” Lysander repeats, his voice quiet.

“I didn’t mean it like that,” Andrej tries, but he knows this is it. Lysander is pissed off and maybe with right, too.

“Yes, you meant it like that.”   
And Andrej can’t say anything to defend himself.

~+~  
“And it’s not my fault! I can’t just will my brain to write about Lysander. The writing part is my ES, you know. It’s not a choice, not a decision I make. It just flows.”

“I know,” Lisa says.

He knows she does. She is a painter. He has no idea where her pictures come from, dreams, fantasy, some part that belongs to her and the universe alike. She calls her muse Emma. Andrej doesn’t call his muse anything except ES.

“William is what made me write in the first place. He is, he was…” he stops frustrated with himself. He can’t explain it to anyone, you have to get it somehow.

“I understand,” she says, nodding.   
He takes a cookie from the pale green plate she painted herself. Her baking is as uncommon as her art, but still delicious.

“I know he’s frustrated and jealous, but he doesn’t have a reason to be. I haven’t seen or heard from William in over six years.”

“He could be dead for all you know?”

“I know he’s not,” he answers her and she gives him a look.

“Whatever.”

“I love Lysander, I do, but I can’t deal with his unfounded jealousy at all.”

“You want to break up with him. After nearly two years?”

“I don’t want to break up with him. I just don’t want him to be in pain anymore and I don’t want to hurt him either.”

“Just talk to him. Maybe he’ll get it.”   
Andrej nods, but he doesn’t think so. Lysander hasn’t gotten it yet, why should be this week different?

~+~  
Andrej is smoking on his balcony and brooding when he hears Lysander enter the apartment.

“Bedroom,” he yells and waits for Lysander to come in.

“Smoking is bad for you.”

“Living is bad for me,” Andrej says with a soft smile. Lysander smiles back.

“I’m sorry I flipped out on you.”

“It’s okay,” Andrej answers, exhaling smoke.

“It’s just that it’s hard sometimes.”

“I don’t compare you to him or anyone else for that matter,” Andrej says.

“I know,” Lysander answers, leaning against the door-frame. His arms crossed over his chest. He looks pretty, Andrej thinks, like someone William would go after. Like someone he would fuck or kill or both.

“It’s not that I don’t want to write about us, it’s just that I can’t. He is my inspiration. My ES. My –“

Lysander interrupts him with “Your messed up eternal love.”

Andrej gives him a look and takes another deep drag. The cigarette is nearly burned down to the filter. He shakes his head. “Maybe. It doesn’t mean I don’t love you.”

“No it doesn’t,” Lysander says, uncurling and stepping away from the door. He crosses the room to stand beside Andrej. Andrej makes room for him, so Lysander can stand in the V of his legs. He doesn’t say anything, just bends down to kiss Andrej. It starts out soft and tender, but gets heavier pretty soon. Andrej flips the butt out over the balcony and lets Lysander drag him to the bed.

~+~  
Just because they’re not fighting anymore about William – who is nothing more than the ghost of the past – doesn’t mean things are back to normal.   
Sometimes Lysander looks at him while he writes and something behind his eyes is sad or angry or both. Andrej can’t deal with it, because Lysander doesn’t say anything.   
It feels like they are crossing out days in the calendar. Another one went well, another one we survived. Andrej doesn’t want to be in a relationship that only survives. Day after day after day.   
Sometimes when Andrej fucks him like Lysander likes it, a bit too slow at the beginning a bit too rough near the end it feels like they’re saying goodbye in ways Andrej never could fathom.   
Then there are days where everything seems just fine. Like it was in the beginning. He clings to these days. Maybe Lysander does too.

~+~  
When he’s alone, he takes out the notebook and reads in it sometimes. It feels like such a long time ago. His sloppy handwriting stares back at him, kind of cheerful and innocent. He doesn’t feel like that boy anymore and he misses that boy sometimes.   
Tries to find him in the mirror on Sunday mornings when Lysander is still sleeping in his bed.   
Tom rolls his eyes every time Andrej mentions it and it’s reassuring that Tom still thinks Andrej is that dumb kid.

“Do you sometimes feel like you need a change of skin?” Andrej asks.

Tom raises an eyebrow. “Change of skin? Not change of place?”

“Yes, like you want to be someone else, not somewhere else. You, my dear friend are always somewhere else.”

“True enough,” Tom answers.

“Where are you now anyway? India?”

Tom rolls his eyes. “Africa, some pretty beach I don’t know the name of.”

“We never know where you are.”

“You are the only person that seems to care about it anyway,” Tom says with a grin.

“It’s because I know all about the things that go bump in the night.”

“You need to stop reading those stupid monster novels.”

“Hey, I _write_ those stupid novels!” Andrej answers.

“Oh, yeah, I forgot. What is that new thing about?”

“A change of skin,” Andrej answers, mysteriously and Tom laughs.

~+~  
Andrej didn’t lie to Tom. The new book is titled ‘Change of Skin’ and it’s about skinwalkers and shapeshifters. It plays in the same universe his second book does. Which everyone, except people who know him in person and read the manuscript, think is the first.   
It’s not a love story at all this time and the main character is called ‘Thomas’. He thinks Tom will like it.

~8~  
“So, you know Andrej?” Petra asks.   
He should have known she wouldn’t let it go. And now with Andrej’s new book out, well he should have know is all.

“Yeah.”

“What is he like?”

“He’s…a brilliant author.”

“Obviously,” she says, “but you didn’t know that, did you?”

He shakes his head. “No I didn’t. When we met he was 19 and wanted to be an actor,” William answers.

She smiles. “You were so young back then,” she says.  
He was, William thinks, but doesn’t say it out loud. They are nearly the same age now and soon Andrej will be older, will look older. Not that it matters or anything as they can never be and- why the hell is he even thinking about it?

“Sometimes I miss his smile. The first time we met I thought he was a girl. He...” William stops and cocks his head. He doesn’t actually know how to describe it to someone who didn’t meat Andrej.

“He’s pretty?”

“Yes, of course, but that is not all. It’s not what I mean. Andrej, he, well it seems like he can just switch between the genders. Can make himself look male or female. It’s hard to explain. It sure helps that he’s pretty, although.”

Petra smiles. “You liked him.”

“Yes, I liked him,” he answers and doesn’t elaborate. He doesn’t think it’s necessary. A part of him is waiting for her to ask the why question. Why didn’t they stay together then, but she doesn’t.

~+~  
“He’s writing about you. You. You are all he is writing about,” Emilia says. She doesn’t seem upset about it exactly, but something is definitely going on.

“I know. I read the second book, too.”

“Did you think a bit more about Budapest?” She asks out of the blue.

He shakes his head. “No, I think England would be nice.”

“England is cold and depressing.”

“What was the last time you where to England, Emilia?”

“1922.” She answers him with a look. “What does that have to do with anything?”

He shrugs. “I just don’t feel like Budapest is the City to be right now.”

“Okay, but I really kind of hate England on sheer principal. Awful people.”

He laughs. “They’re all dead by now, I’m sure, Emilia.”

She sighs. “You really want to go?”

“I want us to stay in the country for a while,” he admits, biting his lip. He doesn’t feel like a lot of people.

“You want to hide in a cottage somewhere?” Her voice sounds surprised. She didn’t see that one coming.

He nods. “I was thinking about it for a while now.”

“What’s with Petra?”

“We aren’t anything except friends,” he says.

“You know that’s unhealthy. She is perfectly fine, pretty even and she wants to have crazy sex with you.”

“All the crazy sex I could ever want to have, I have with you,” he answers and means it.   
She smiles slowly, pleased.

“I could rent us a small cottage, it’s not like we need a lot of stuff. We only drink tea and coffee anyway. We don’t even have to eat if we don’t want to. And I don’t need all the stuff we have here anyway. I’m beginning to dislike the closet anyway and the bathroom tiles.”

“I think the tiles are awesome,” he says.

“Are you blind? The colour could be described as mud if you’re feeling like being nice. I hated the tiles from the start,” she states.

“Okay.”

“Go and say goodbye to your friend then. Have goodbye sex and give her a filthy kiss from me too. I’m going to find us a nice little house we can hide in for a while,” she says, dismissing him.

~+~  
“You’re moving away?” Petra asks. She is holding her coffee mug too tightly. He is a bit afraid she might break it.

“This never was a- we never intended to stay that long in the first place.”

“I feel so special,” she answers. He knows she was going for sarcastic, but it sounded more like she means it.

“We are nomads. Modern, filthy rich nomads, but nomads nevertheless,” he tries to explain.

“I know now how Andrej was feeling when you left,” she whispers.

He grabs her hands on impulse and she lets him. “Like everyone is feeling when someone you like leaves,” he answers her.

“You think you’re so wise,” she says, pulling her hands out of his grip. “You bond with 19 year olds over stuff and then leave them a few short years later. Will you keep my number and stare at it and never write a word or call? Like you did with him?”   
He feels angry suddenly at her and at himself for telling her that particular small secret of his. The thing is that she doesn’t sound angry or accusing, she sounds like she really just wants to know.

“I’m not coming back here,” he answers her and she looks at him.

“You’re leaving for good. You are leaving me for good.” Maybe it should be a question. Maybe he would have liked it to be one, for her not to sound so sure of it.

“Yeah. It’s-”

“Don’t say it’s easier that way, because that’s stupid and I’m sure you know that too,” she interrupts him.   
He keeps quiet. What can you answer to that anyway?

~+~  
“You look like your hamster died. I guess there was no great, fabulous, crazy sex?”

He gives her a look. “Did you find something?”

“We’re leaving tomorrow morning,” she answers.

He nods. “I’m going to pack my stuff.”   
He is fingering the edges of Andrej’s book. Petra’s book. The one with the coffee stains and the phone number written lightly in pencil on the inside of the back cover. He is sure he doesn’t deserve it. What he isn’t sure about is why he just didn’t leave it on her nightstand. He usually doesn’t take other people’s stuff – except their death and that doesn’t count, because well, they’re dead.

“For heaven’s sake, just throw in into the bag and be done with it. Don’t stare at it all night,” Emilia says from behind him.

“It’s stupid and sentimental,” he answers.

“I’m taking you with me everywhere I go, too,” she replies and he throws the book into the bag.

 

~9~  
Andrej finds Lysander on his bed with the purple notebook in his hands. He’s leafing through it. It looks a bit like he marked a few pages with his fingers.

“What are you doing?”

Lysander looks up and directly in his eyes. “Something about this reads like a diary,” he says.

“I told you that you are not allowed to read it,” he says sharply.

“You believe all of this, don’t you?” Lysander asks.

Andrej shakes his head. “Put it away and go.”

“You throwing me out?”

“I don’t think this is going to work.”

“Because of him!” Lysander throws the notebook on the bed as he gets up.

“You’re ridiculous!”

“Yes, you tell me that! And still, you are… He is your… He is kind of a nightmare, Andrej. He’s poisoning us.”

“No, you are. He is just a fictional person on paper for me now. Why can’t it be the same for you?”

“Because you love him!”

“I love you,” Andrej says, because it’s still true. He still loves Lysander in other ways than he did at the beginning, but that’s good. Love has to change with them to survive. Maybe Lysander’s love didn’t change at all.

“It just doesn’t seem enough anymore,” Lysander answers.

~+~  
“You broke up?” Lisa asks.

“I guess. He said some stuff, I said some stuff, and then he left and said he’ll be back for his stuff and to give back the key on Wednesday. I think he doesn’t want me to be around.”

“I’m sorry,” she says petting his hair.

“It’s not that I thought we would last forever or anything, I just thought it would be longer than two years.” He’s curled up on her couch, letting her stroke his hair. He feels miserable and kind of lost.

“Two years is a long time, Andrej.”

“Forever is a long time,” Andrej mumbles.

“Only vampires have forever,” Lisa answers softly.

Andrej sighs. “Can I have ice cream now?”

“Sure, honey.”

~+~  
Lysander’s stuff is gone when he comes home late Wednesday evening. It’s cold and rainy outside and he appreciates it. Sometimes it’s nice when the weather mirrors your mood.   
His bathroom counter looks empty without Lysander’s stuff on it, and Andrej misses his stupid pink toothbrush suddenly painfully.  
He just wants to curl up in bed and never get up, so he strips and does just that.

~+~  
4 a.m. knows all his secrets. It’s like when he was 19 and restless, trying to figure out who he was, but everyone tries to figure that out when they’re 19.   
He doesn’t sleep well, because he misses Lysander’s weight beside him, his warmth and his solid body. Lysander’s breath on his skin. His fingers curled around Andrej’s hip.   
It’s stupid how you can get used to it so much. Before Lysander, he never missed any of his boyfriends and maybe that should tell him something and maybe he can write about it now.   
The ache in his bones, and the tingle on his skin when he thinks about Lysander’s fingers. Long and slender and a bit thicker than his own. How perfect they felt around his dick or inside him.   
He turns around frustrated and wants to punch something, instead he gets up. There is a second of hesitation before his feet hit the cold hardwood floor. He presses his toes against it and then stretches them. The hardwood floor warms slowly while he sits there, thinking. He has no clue what to do with himself anymore. The night outside seems endless again. Andrej knows it’s not. It never is endless, even in the parts of the world where it lasts weeks. The perfect places for vampires, if the legends were true, but they aren’t. Andrej knows that William looks beautiful in sunlight. He just prefers the shadows, because it’s easier to stalk prey by night.   
Not that William doesn’t look beautiful by night, because he does. There is something about his face, the perfect shape of his nose, his dark eyes that don’t have a real colour and if Andrej had to describe them he would use a word like ‘mud’. He did in fact use that word in his journal. His fingers itch to get it out again. To sit down on the floor, curl up in the blanket and read his and William’s story. He doesn’t.   
It would feel like cheating on the pain Lysander left behind.

~+~  
“Thanks?” Andrej says, eyebrow raised in mockery.

“Don’t look at me like that. You need a new one to write down your new heartbreak story.”  
He runs his fingers around the edges of the notebook. It feels heavy and solid in his hands. The paper heavy to the touch. It’s definitely more expensive than the first one he got from here. She can afford it now, that’s why. “It’s blue,” she adds needlessly because he has eyes and can see that.

“Yes, I can see that.”

“I mean, you can redecorate it, if you want, but…” she trails off shrugging.

“No, hey, thanks. I like it.”

“I’m throwing a pink glitter pen in too,” she answers and he smiles.

~+~  
It takes him six weeks to write it down and make it a story he can let go, can detach himself from. Six sleepless weeks and it doesn’t have a title, but it’s kind of a ghost story. He calls it ‘4 a.m. Knows All My Secrets’ and emails parts of it to Tom who is in Budapest again, because Budapest has all the pretty girls apparently.   
He keeps the notebook on his bedside table for another week. Stroking it before he gets to bed and giving it a look when he wakes up. It’s some kind of comfort.

~+~  
“So, you wrote a ghost story no one ever will get to read?”

“You read it,” Andrej answers.

Tom waves his hand, dismissing it. Andrej loves video phones. “I didn’t read it all. It’s like your first book in places,” he says.

“Is it? I don’t feel like it is.” This one feels more final he thinks, but doesn’t say it.

“It’s maybe a bit more hopeless. You don’t think Lysander will be back.”

“No, I don’t,” he answers. “He’s left town for awhile while I was writing our story.”

“Okay…”

“I know what you think, but it’s not a dick-move. He’s just that way. That’s how he deals with stuff.”

“Whatever. I am on team Andrej when it comes to these things,” Tom replies.

Andrej smiles. “I know. Thanks.”

“Any time,” Tom says and disconnects the call.

~+~  
Sunday night he decides that it’s time to put the notebook aside. Put it into the drawer with the other heartbreaking love-story no one will ever read in full. Tom was smart enough to only send a few chapters the first time he sent it to a publisher.   
He kisses it goodbye and pats the cover and lays it on his pillow for the last night, like he did with the first one, the untitled one.

~+~  
Monday is a disaster. He opens the drawer after breakfast and wants to put the notebook down on top of the other, maybe even read a few pages, because he likes to do that from time to time, but it’s gone.

“Son of a bitch!” he yells and then collapses on the bed. It’s gone, the only thing he had left of William is gone. He stares at the floor and doesn’t know what to _do_. He’s so angry he wants to kill someone. Lysander is at the top of that list. In fact he’s the only one on that list. Andrej never wanted to kill anyone before. He feels betrayed. Raped even.   
A part of him wants to tear the ghost story to pieces. Write a new one, one where the main character dies, maybe. He doesn’t. This is his story. Even if Lysander decided to change the ending.   
Andrej doesn’t even want to think about what Lysander is going to do with it. There are a few possibilities, none of them are desirable.

~+~  
“I’m going to kill him,” Tom says. His voice is very calm. He means it.

“You don’t know where he is right now. No one knows.”

“I see you’re not even trying to talk me out of it,” Tom answers.

“I would do it myself. I never wanted to harm anyone in my life, but I want to see him hurt,” he admits in a small voice. He feels awful wanting that. He hates that Lysander could make him feel that way.

“Andrej,” Tom says softly.

“I don’t know why he did it. I mean, why steal it? What will he do with it?”

“If there is anything of the man left you loved he’ll give it back, or burn it to ashes, if he isn’t-“

“He’s going to publish it. I know. I thought about it. He has a friend who is a publisher. He could. He could. And that would be a disaster.” It would be rape.

“I’m sorry,” Tom says.

“I want to cry,” Andrej admits.

“I want to hug you,” Tom answers.

“I want to be anywhere but here right now.”

“I’m booking you a ticket, you’re coming over.”

“You’re in Mexico!”

“I’m in Warsaw!” Tom corrects.

“They don’t speak my language there.”

“You’ll be fine, I speak whatever I have to,” Tom answers.

“Okay. I’ll pack my stuff.”

“Bring the ghost story. I want to burn it ritually in my backyard.”

“You have a backyard?”

“You can bet your ass on it,” Tom answers.

~10~  
Living in the countryside isn’t as boring as William thought it would be and it seems to calm Emilia down. She seems happier somehow and she’s spending a lot of time in the garden behind the house. Lying around and doing nothing but stare at the leaves above her or planting flowers.

“I like to see things grow,” she says, her hands dirty from earth and grass. There is a certain dreamy quality to her voice he likes and doesn’t like at the same time. She sounded like that the eleven months she refused to go out and feed or to go out at all. That was four years after he met her. He’s worried about her. She is the only constant in his life and he is afraid of losing her.

“I like to see you on your knees,” he tells her and she laughs, grabbing his face with her dirty fingers and kissing him. He can feel the soil on his skin, small clumps of it against his cheek.

“I bet you like that,” she answers as she steps away from him. “It was a good idea to hide away from the world.”

“Yeah,” he replies, rubbing at his cheek absentminded.

~+~  
He’s sitting under a maroon tree while she is talking to one of their new neighbours. An old lady who lives a bit away. Somewhere in the middle of nowhere. Like they do. He doesn’t try to spy on their conversation, but he’s surprised every time that she’s so good with humans, especially the old ones. Maybe it’s because she is so old as well. Maybe the old ones are the only ones that can relate or she can relate to.   
William’s playing with the phone with one hand and ripping out blades of grass with the other. He feels okay, content even. He has the feeling he could stay here forever. Just sit here, maybe lay down when he’s tired and in no time he would sink into the earth and be part of it. It doesn’t sound as insane in his head as it should.

~+~  
“How do you know you’re going crazy?” He asks out of the blue. She is preparing a croissant, but looks up when he speaks.

“You don’t. Your behaviour will always seem rational to you.”

“Hmm,” he says.

“That’s why it’s actually good to be with someone. In the old times, vampires were always walking through time in pairs.”

“Forever and ever gets a whole new meaning now.”

“It was more of a ‘until death do us apart’ thing, to be honest.”

“You killed the crazy vampire?” he asks.

She nods. “It didn’t work for everyone. See they got attached and, well, it’s hard to kill someone you love.”

“Or really easy.”

“Yes, or that.”

~+~  
He doesn’t think he’s going crazy, it’s just that being here, alone, with her is a bit like living in their own world. Even the bloodlust is somehow dimmed. They‘re like Adam and Eve, or you know, the monster version of Adam and Eve and this is their garden.

~+~  
William is lying around in the grass, in the shadow of the maroon tree, doing nothing when she sits down next to him. He smiles up at her without opening his eyes. He likes these lazy afternoons with her.

“Did I ever tell you how I killed the leader of the male vampires?” she asks.

“No,” he answers, opening his eyes.

“It was in his bedroom, he didn’t think I could do it, but I did. I spilled his blood on his ugly marble floor.”

“You didn’t like his floor? You _love_ the cold smoothness of marble. You love how some of it looks like veins under pale skin.”

“He never had any taste,” she answers. It seems to William like there is another story in that small   
bit of information. A darker one, a sad one.

“I’m sure that is a crime that needs to be punished.”

She grabs his arm then, a bit too tight. He doesn’t flinch. “I killed him because I had to, he would’ve destroyed us all.”

“I believe you,” he answers, his fingers closing around her wrist. He squeezes and she sighs. The leaves rustle in the soft breeze.

“I could be lying.”

“Yes, you could. But you aren’t.” He is sure of that. She doesn’t share much about her past with him, but he knows she doesn’t lie about it. He has no clue why she had the feeling to tell him this little story, but he knows it’s important. For him, maybe. For her, definitely.

She lies down next to him, the cool skin of her arm touching his. “We could sleep for a while out   
here.”

“Yes,” she answers.


	3. Nightlife

**Part III  
Nightlife**

 

~1~  
The news explodes everywhere and the first thing Andrej does is call Tom and then his mom.

“So, I know we are cursed with Hunter blood and stuff and I need you to send me someone who can train me,” he says.

She is silent on the other side of the phone. “What did you do?”

“Grandma should have told me, you know. I would have liked that,” he goes on, ignoring her question.

“We aren’t in that business. It’s not something your father and I wanted for us and for our kids.”

“I know, mama. I know, but things got out of hand.”

“What happened?” she asks again and he tells her everything. “Well…” she says taking a deep breath.

“I know. I didn’t do it on purpose. I just didn’t know about the Hunter thing and vampires and that my ex-boyfriend would be a slimy bag of worms.”

“It’s not your fault. I’m sending Dimitri over.” Her voice is firm. She made a decision. She may not like how that is turning out, but she is going to deal, because that’s what she does.

“I can pay for the ticket,” he offers.

“Thank you.”

“Thank you,” he whispers.

~+~  
“Midnight Lover is the worst title ever!” Tom says.

Andrej groans. It _is_ the worst title ever. “I hate him a lot. He’s fucked my life up.”

“At least he didn’t put your name on it.”

“It’s the first William book, Tom! Everyone knows I wrote it. My fan sites are exploding! And I’m an author not a freaking rock star.”

“Did you talk to your publisher?”

“That was the first thing I did. They’re going to sue him, of course, but what good does that do me now?” he asks. Because seriously. No good at all. He is pretty sure Emilia will hunt him down and kill him with her bare hands, wearing gloves or something, but she’ll do it. And William. He doesn’t even want to think about how William feels about all of this.

“Calm down, Andrej,” Tom says. His voice soft.

Andrej takes a deep breath. He tries, but it’s fucking hard. “He’s going to kill me.”

“Who?”

“William.”

“I’m sure he’ll know it’s not your fault and maybe he doesn’t even read books and totally forgot about you. What is he now? 36? I’m sure he has a family and shit.”

“Uhm, yeah…” Andrej says. He knows that now they are the same age. He and William. Soon he’ll be older. “Mom’s sending Dimitri over.”

“Your cousin Dimitri?”

“Yeah.”

“Who you hate?”

“I don’t _hate_ him,” Andrej answers. He doesn’t hate Dimitri, he just didn’t get him and his side of the family until now. Now he knows stuff and is sure Dimitri was trained to be a Hunter. Maybe he even likes being one. Andrej doesn’t want to be a trained hunter. Not at nearly 28. What the fuck. He isn’t built to be one either. He will fail and vampires will eat him. Or not, since his blood is poison to them. But the point still stands. They will hunt him down and it’s a good thing his mom now knows why he’ll die a horrible death in a back alley at midnight.

“Are you even listening to me?” Tom asks, wry amusement in his voice.

“I was thinking about how I’ll die.”

“I bet it was very dramatic,” Tom answers.

“Uhm, maybe. I’m an author after all.”

“He’s not going to kill you for that book. You wrote about him later too.”

“This one is personal. It’s about vampire politics and shit. Stuff no mortal should know.”

“Are you listening to yourself?” Tom asks.

“I know. I am not confusing reality and fiction, Tom. I just want to be done with this and maybe I want someone to get me Lysander’s head on a silver platter.”

“Be careful what you wish for.”

Andrej sighs. “If it weren’t for Dimitri I would so buy a ticket and visit you in Kenya.”

“I’m in Spain,” Tom answers. Andrej can hear the smile in his voice.

“Same difference,” Andrej says, because it is. Too far away and he can’t get there anyway.

“Yeah, it really is,” Tom replies.

~+~  
Andrej opens the door in a dress, his hair a mess and one high heel in hand, the other on his right foot.

”Yes?” he asks.

“I think I got the wrong address,” the guy says.

“Okay, so who did you want to speak to? I know all my neighbours.”

“Andrej Iseni?”

“You’re Dimitri,” Andrej says, opening the door wider. “I thought we would meet at the airport? In two hours? I made a sign and everything.”

Dimitri stares at him. “You’re a girl? I was sure you-“

“I’m not a girl,” Andrej cuts in. “Come in?”

“Sure,” Dimitri answers. There is something in his eyes Andrej doesn’t like.

“Coffee?” he asks, throwing his shoes into a corner as he makes his way to the kitchen.

“Did you just get back home?”

“I was out. Clubbing,” he answers, preparing coffee. He makes it old school, two spoons of coffee in a cup with half a spoon of sugar and then hot, hot water on top. He stirs carefully clockwise three times, because grandma said it brings luck.

“In a dress,” Dimitri states as he sits down. He left the suitcase in the hall.

“In a dress. I like wearing them. Didn’t mama tell you? Didn’t anyone show you pictures of Martha’s gay son?” he asks, as he sets down a mug in front of Dimitri. His voice is totally calm. He is so done pretending he cares about this shit. Life is short and he learned that when he met William. In comparison to a vampire a human life is, well, freaking short.

“They did, but you know…”

“No, I don’t,” Andrej answers.

“It’s different to see it, to hear it from you.”

“I am not going to hide just because you’re here. I am who I am and I need to know how to protect myself.”

“You are pretty sure they are coming after you.”

“Did you read the book?” he asks, taking a sip of his coffee.

”Midnight Lover?” Dimitri raises an eyebrow in mockery.

“Yeah, that,” Andrej bites out. It’s possible he hates Lysander for the stupid title the most.

“Yeah, I read it. So, it’s all true then. You were about to fuck the enemy.”

“In my defence, I didn’t know he was the enemy at the time.”

“You know now,” Dimitri says, taking a sip of his coffee. “But you don’t think he is.” It’s a statement.

“No, I don’t think he is. Doesn’t matter, though, even if he isn’t pissed off about this, others will be.”

“And they know now we’re chosen. Like they are.”

“There aren’t many secrets left,” Andrej says. His hair falls into his face as he puts his head into his hands. He is tired and he doesn’t want to talk about his love for William with someone who wants kill him.

“You know, they would have hanged you as a traitor for this a few years ago.”

“I bet your part of the family still wants to do that,” Andrej answers.

“My dad, sure, but he doesn’t call the shots.”

Andrej looks up. “You want something from me.”

“I’m here to protect you, to help you protect yourself.”

“And you think you can get more information out of me. Things that aren’t in the book,” Andrej says.

“It would certainly help to know more about the enemy. You do realise that you are the first Hunter in the history of Hunters who survived this?”

Andrej laughs. “I bet the other vampires tell that shit to William as well. It’s always kill or be killed and we just didn’t.”

“Yeah, you changed the rules of the game.”

“No,” Andrej replies. “We just didn’t play the game.”  
Dimitri smiles like he likes what he sees. Andrej isn’t sure it’s a good thing.

 

~2~  
“Did you read Midnight Lover?” Emilia asks. She sneers, an honest to god sneer. “The title is ridiculous!” she throws the book on the couch and looks at him.

“It is.”

“What did this bastard child even think?”

“I’m sure it was not Andrej.”

“I _know_ it was not Andrej. I do read the websites as well.” She puts her hands on her hips. Her pale pink dress bunches around her hips. Her feet are bare. She looks kind of hot and kind of ridiculous.

“So?”

“Someone stole his book and other vampires know now that you exist.”

“It’s a book, Emilia.”

“Oh, you’re so young. I wish we could afford to be that naïve.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Tell me.”

“We are around for centuries, Bill. There is a whole department that only reads books about vampires so they’ll know what humans know or Hunters.”

“You guys are a secret society. Like the Vatican and the Mafia.”

“We, that includes you. They know about you. They know you are out here. They even know your name. Good thing they don’t know mine, but let me tell you something, there aren’t that many black vampires out there.”

“You mean they’ll find us soon.”

“First they’ll go for the author.”

“Andrej?”

“They aren’t stupid,” she answers, cocking her head.

“They will go for the other guy too, you think?” he asks.

“We should get to him first. See, he knows Andrej. Knows his address. I am sure what Andrej told the press and on the website is true. The book was stolen.”

“You’re going to kill him, aren’t you?”

“I’m sure that scumbag is not a Hunter and he deserves it. And don’t even pretend you don’t want to see him suffer and dead.”

He shrugs. He doesn’t want to pretend that. “I do want to see him suffer. He messed up our lives.”

“See, we have to find that stupid jerk and kill him with our own hands.”

“Or fangs.”

“Or fangs,” she repeats, smiling. In that moment she looks like the angel of death she sometimes is. Like a horrible and beautiful goddess. He isn’t sure if he’s more scared or turned on by it.

~+~  
Finding Lysander is really not that hard for Emilia. She tracked down Hunters and vampires, so a human is really no match for her at all. That stupid boy didn’t even try to cover his tracks. Maybe because he didn’t think a bloody goddess would show up at his door. With a beautiful man.

“Wanna let us in?” William asks. They don’t need to be invited in, but they don’t want to cause a scene right here. Where everybody could see them. The building is deserted right now, but god only knows how long it will stay that way.

“Uhm…sure,” Lysander says and William smiles.

~+~  
Emilia lets him make her coffee and sits down in his expensive looking apartment, says a few nice things about the furniture before she goes for his veins. Not his real veins, not yet.

“So, you stole Andrej’s book,” she says, sipping her coffee calmly.

“What?”

“Andrej? Nice little boy, pretty like a girl? I am sure it rings some bells at least. As you fucked him and all.”

“Did he send you?” Lysander asks, suspicion in his voice.

She laughs. It gives even William the chills. “No, he didn’t. He wouldn’t like us being here with you.”

“What the hell? Who are you?”

She sets her mug down carefully on the shiny tabletop and looks at him. “I’m your nightmare. Revenge even, if you want to call it that. I think I like the word justice better.”

“What?” His eyes are wide and William is really impressed by her right now.

She sighs. “See, William here,” she nods in his direction and Lysander follows her gaze, “He has a thing for Andrej and we don’t like how you dealt with your break-up, honey.”

“You’re William,” Lysander says in a whisper. William nods. “You look like he described you. You look like he-“

“Yes, see, honey, look at me?” she asks, softly, “That’s it. We are not human and because you felt hurt or whatever, you fucked up our lives. There are things out there. Things in the dark that want to eat you.”

“And we,” William says, “We are these things.”

Emilia flashes him a sharp smile. Lysander knocks the mug over as he tries to flee. It’s so stupid really.  
They don’t make a mess out of things. Emilia isn’t even in the mood to kill him, because it’s no fun at all. William thinks they will put Lysander away in an asylum for a long time after what she did to him, but he can’t muster up the energy to care.

~+~  
“And now we need to go back to that stupid town that started it all and find your one true love.”

“Why do I have the feeling you’re not telling me something?” he asks, outside the apartment. The air is cold and hurts a bit in his lungs when he speaks. He needs to feed soon.

“Because I’m not telling you something.”

“Emilia,” he stresses.

She grabs his hand with her small gloved one. “I am worried, okay? I am so worried right now. They will come for you and they will use him to get to you.”

“You think they’ll kill him?”

“If he’s lucky, yes. I know I told you we kill Hunters quickly because their blood is poisonous, but there were a few, there was one vampire who enjoyed it anyway. He took all the precautions there were when you wanted to torture a Hunter and he enjoyed torturing them so much. Even his own kind. He did unspeakable things. Unspeakable things for our kind, William and we are in no way delicate.”

“You killed him, right? It was Bryan.”

She nods. “Yes, I killed him.”

“But that’s not all.”

“He had followers. I am not sure what they wanted to achieve and I don’t want to know. All I know is they fucked up the balance of nature and we, the women, we are all about the balance of nature. They kill some of us, we kill some of them. We don’t try to mess with nature itself.”

“Is this some Underworld-crap?” he asks.

She laughs, short and sweet, but with an edge. “I really wish I could say no, but I don’t know.”

“You said you killed them all. So no danger from that front.” She bites her lip, staring out onto the street. “Emilia?”

“We are pretty sure, we killed them all.”

“You don’t know?”

“We didn’t have a citizen register at that time. We didn’t exactly know how many vampires there were.”

“I don’t like this.”

“Me neither.”

“You don’t think I was made by accident. You think another male vampire made me. A dangerous one even, maybe?”

“I don’t know.”

“Emilia!”

“I don’t know!” she answers sharply and he pulls her into a hug.

“It’s going to be okay.”

“The past always catches up with you,” she mumbles into his neck.

“It’s going to be okay,” he repeats.

 

~3~  
Dimitri has his knife out in a flash and Andrej didn’t even have time to scream the obvious _no_ when he throws it at William’s heart. The blade is poisonous. It has Dimitri’s blood on it, but Andrej has his own just like that.

“The fuck?! Honey?” Emilia says, holding the knife in her gloved hand, caught it midair.

“Oh thank god,” Andrej answers, pushing past Dimitri.

“Oh, that your pet-vampire?” he asks.

Andrej gives him a look and then rolls his eyes. “Yes and I would like for you to not throw sharp objects at them.”

“Vampires,” Dimitri answers with a grin. In these past few weeks, Andrej has really learned to appreciate Dimitri’s kind of humour. It’s cool, somehow.

“Pet-vampire? Really?” William asks.

Andrej wants to hug him so badly it hurts. “You’re back,” he says, smiling.

“We had to, honey,” Emilia answers. She grabs his shirt and pulls him into a hug. He can feel her breath on his skin and exhales slowly. He can also feel Dimitri’s gaze on them. Watchful. He would kill them in a flash if they should try anything at all.

“I missed you,” he whispers.

“You’re such a liar,” she whispers back, affection colouring her voice.

“That’s very touching and stuff, but maybe we should go inside where there aren’t people who could ask questions,” Dimitr throws in.  
William gives him a look and Andrej’s heart clenches. He knows now how to kill a vampire, he knows everything about hunting that Dimitri could teach him in that short time he’s here. It makes him sad.

“I’m sorry,” he says to William as Emila lets him go.

“It wasn’t your fault,” William answers and Andrej throws caution to the wind, because fuck it all, he throws himself at William and hugs him with all he has. “I missed you too,” William whispers so softly that Andrej isn’t even sure he heard it.

~+~  
Dimitri is still weary around the vampires living in the other guestroom of the safe house. They seem normal enough, if you can ignore the blood-drinking and the itchy feeling he has around them. More around Emilia than William, which is strange, but hey, this is a fucking strange situation. It doesn’t help that Emilia is hot as fuck and that Andrej is still head over heels for William.  
All of Dimitri’s alarm-bells ring very loudly. Something is going to happen. This will be such a clusterfuck.

~+~  
“Did you kill Lysander?” Andrej asks the second night in, his voice soft.

William exhales smoke before he answers. “No, we didn’t.”

“But you wanted to.”

“Because you wanted to?” William asks, turning to look at Andrej’s profile in the moonlight, it’s such a fucking cliché, but he does look beautiful.

“I wanted to. When he stole the book, betrayed me like this and I _knew_ he would publish it to make his point clear,” he answers.

“What point?”

“That I’m not over you and never will as long as I can’t share our story with the world.”

“And look what it got him,” William says, inhaling deeply.

“I thought you said you didn’t kill him.”

“We didn’t, but we made sure he won’t enjoy the rest of his life.”  
Andrej takes a deep breath and exhales slowly. William is pretty sure he didn’t want to hear that. “We are evil creatures of the night, Andrej. We like what we do.”

“I’m not delusional because I love you, you know?” Andrej replies softly, not looking at him. He leans on the railing and stares at the city. The curve of his neck is really pretty like that and the soft flesh of his arms. William can’t help himself, he just leans in and kisses the soft skin on Andrej’s arm. Andrej makes a strangled noise and stiffens for a long moment before he relaxes. “You really shouldn’t do that.”  
William hums against his skin and licks it, just because. This is okay, they can do this. This is pretty safe. He really only wants to suck on that skin, watch how the blood rushes to the surface of it and then- He pushes away and doesn’t look at Andrej. He doesn’t know what the hell he was thinking.

“Dimitri says that some of us are like a flame to your kind. Not all of the Hunters, but the weaker ones.”

“What?” this doesn’t make much sense to William.

“I am not really good at the whole hunting-part of the hunting-thing, you know? In other times they wouldn’t even have trained me. I would be bait and maybe die because of it. I don’t know how it works, but it’s there, so I am the flame and you are the moth and the rest…” he trails off.

“You’re saying you can make me want you?”

“No,” Andrej answers, turning to look at him. His face looks very serious. “I can make you want to bite me.”

“Oh, well, fuck.”

“It was always there, but when I began the training with Dimitri it just came out, I guess?”

“You are learning how to kill vampires.”

“I knew they would come for me. I knew that they would want you and that they would come for me because of it. I had to learn how to protect myself.”  
William nods, because what can he say to that?

~+~  
So, Emilia thinks, great. Her life is a soap opera. She lives with a condemned man and two vampire Hunters. And she has the feeling something from the past wants to hurt her. Hurt them. Damn this stupid Lysander boy! But thoughts like this are futile. ‘What ifs’ never helped anyone. The only thing to do is wait and prepare.  
She hates waiting for a battle. She always was more the attack is the best defence type. It hasn’t changed over the centuries.

 

~4~  
Andrej is making coffee when Dimitri enters the kitchen. He sits down and watches his cousin. Objectively Andrej is really freaking beautiful and he can see why people fall in love with him. Men and women alike. When he’s honest for a minute his heart stuttered a bit too as he saw him in the doorway the first time they met after all these years. Andrej’s hair is a messy knot in his neck, strands falling out as he moves around. His neck is delicate and Dimitri can see the veins under his skin. It’s so pale. It’s a map, an invitation: please bite here. It’s hard to resist. His fingers ache with the need to touch. He balls them to fists and takes a deep breath.

“You’re up early,” he says.

“I can’t sleep. Waiting for something to happen makes me restless,” Andrej answers.

“William makes you restless.”

Andrej turns around and puts a mug in front of him on the table. His smile is wry as he sits down. “Living with them makes you pretty restless, too.”

“For other reasons. I was trained to kill them all on sight. You, you…” he trails off taking a sip of his coffee.

“I had no idea what I was getting myself into,” Andrej says.

Dimitri nods. “That’s why my father always said your parents should’ve at least told you the truth.”

“They didn’t want to fuck up my life.”

“No they took away a choice. Just because you are a Hunter by blood doesn’t mean you need to go out and do the job.”

“Hunters are raised to hate.”

Dimitri laughs. “They are vicious creatures. They kill people.”

“And you kill them. I hear they are better now.”

“After the freaking revolution?” Dimitri asks. Andrej nods. “They are, we just didn’t know why and frankly no one would think something like that. A female vampire revolution!”

“You can’t tell anyone about this,” Andrej says softly.

Dimitri gives him a look. “Father would flip if he knew I am _living_ with vampires, Andrej. He is old-fashioned. Kill them all is his motto. It’s a way of life. He would print it on a t-shirt if he would wear any.”

Andrej snickers into his mug. “Can you imagine your father in a t-shirt?”

Dimitri shakes his head. “No, I really can’t.”

“Is there coffee left? Or better tea?” William asks into their giggles.

“There is hot water. You know how to prepare coffee,” Andrej says with a soft smile.

“I’m a guest here,” he answers, flopping down onto a chair. He looks graceful in whatever he does. It’s a bit disturbing. Dimitri’s skin tingles with the knowledge, but it feels strange, muted somehow. He thought that it’s because they are living together now and he’ll adjust to it, but he feels differently about Emilia. He reaches his hand out and strokes William’s bare arm. Both Andrej and William look at him. He thinks Andrej even holds his breath.

“You feel different,” he says, snatching his fingers away.

“Okay?” William answers amused.

“I mean, differently than Emilia. Different than other vampires in general.”

“You met a lot of them?”

“A few, I didn’t kill them all. It’s not necessary when they try to adjust,” he gives Andrej a smile, “Don’t tell my father.”

Andrej smiles back, shaking his head slightly.  
“I thought it was only me, but then I only know these two vampires,” Andrej answers.

“It’s not only you. He feels different. Like-“

“Something’s calling you,” Andrej finishes.

Dimitri nods. He felt it from the start, but ignored it. Andrej sure as hell felt it too, but he didn’t know what that pull was. Hell, Dimitri doesn’t know either. “Maybe it’s because he’s the only male vampire we’ve seen in centuries.”

“And I still don’t know how you couldn’t have caught up on that,” William says.

“You didn’t either.”

“I don’t know any other vampires,” he defends himself.

“We don’t keep a book with names and dates. We only do that with the really bad ones and there weren’t any really bat-shit crazy vampires around in the last hundred years or so.”

“Yes, because the females killed them all.”

“We didn’t know that. Vampires and Hunters don’t mingle, for obvious reasons.”

“Yeah, we’re sworn enemies and all that,” William says breezily and Andrej laughs.

“Look at you two. I love this,” he says innocently.

Dimitri gives him a look. “You would love us to stay here, wouldn’t you? So we would live happily ever after.”

Andrej shrugs. “Yeah, I kind of would like that.”

“You’re sweet,” William says, his voice tender.

“And insane,” Dimitri adds. He means it a bit too.  
Andrej just smiles into his coffee.

~+~  
In any other situation, in any other century she would love this here. The cosy domesticity of the house, the mornings with old-school coffee, the normality of it all.  
It’s hard to enjoy it when you’re waiting for the apocalypse to come.  
The world like they know it will end when they come for William. She knows it, they all know it.  
There is only one thing she can do. She doesn’t like it, but well.

~+~  
“Where’s Emilia?” Andrej asks. He is making tea and wanted to watch a movie he thinks she would enjoy as well.

“Went out.”

“Went out?” he repeats. “We don’t go out. We’re in hiding!”

“She can take care of herself,” William answers, patting the sofa.

“I know she can, I am just worried.”

“Isn’t that cute,” Dimitri throws in from the door. He is holding a bag of chips.

“I bet it is,” William answers with a grin. “We’re so freaking picture perfect right now.”

Andrej ducks his head. Dimitri rolls his eyes at him. “Scoot over.”

William makes room on the couch for him. It’s strange to see him like this. He seems so totally normal, like a human being. But none of them are normal and maybe that’s why this has worked so far. Maybe, Andrej thinks, maybe it works because we want it to.

~+~  
“Are you insane?!” Barbara hisses.

Emilia looks around and then gives her a look. “Probably. Are you going to help me or not?”

Barbara sighs. “I always had the most fun with you,” she answers which is as good as a yes.

“Great.”

“Still don’t know how you always get into such messes.”

“It’s not like I was standing around with a sign, you know?”

Barbara laughs. Her laugh always reminds Emilia of bells, of better times. “I know, I know. Trouble finds you. So, is he cute?”

“Who?”

“Your vampire-boy, your human?”

“My Hunter? They are all cute.”

“Lucky bitch,” Barbara says with deep affection in her voice. “I’ll try my best, you know it. If someone knows something I’m going to find out, but everyone has learned to keep secrets really well, Emilia. You of all people should know that.”

“He’s not doing any harm. He’s just a boy in love and it’s not his fault he was born male.”

“I know that. And I don’t care either way. You didn’t make him, but someone did and I think we both know that it wasn’t an accident. Something’s going on here,” Barbara answers, grabbing her hand, stroking gently.

“I missed you,” Emilia says, because it’s true.

“Well, we aren’t the cuddliest bunch and you always leave your shoes everywhere,” Barbara replies, smiling and that’s true as well.

~+~  
She comes home to find her boys on the couch, sleeping in a pile. She smiles, throws her shoes into a corner and goes over to the kitchen. She opens the window and lights one of Dimitri’s cigarettes. It’s the strong cheap kind where you just know that you’re getting lung cancer from it. Since she can’t get lung cancer, she doesn’t care.  
She has to trust Barbara now. Barbara knows how to find shit out.  
Emilia doesn’t like to put her friend in danger as well. Barbara always was more of a librarian than a warrior, which doesn’t mean she doesn’t know how to cut your head off.  
She would love to snuggle close to them and just drift off, but somehow she feels like someone should keep watch, so she stays awake.

 

~5~  
“You have your weapons stored?” William asks. She shrugs like it’s not a big deal. Maybe for her it’s not a big deal.

“Well, I can’t carry them around, can I?”

“No, but…” he waves his hands uselessly. She gives him a look and he stops, takes a deep breath.  
“It looks like we’re going to war,” he finishes.

“We are. This is war. Them or us.”

“How many do you think want us dead anyway?”

“Just a few. Most of those who fought in the revolution aren’t alive anymore or simply don’t care about the state of the world.” He raises an eyebrow in question. “They went underground. They’re sleeping between worms and maggots.”

“Urgs, thank you for that particular lovely picture.”

“Shouldn’t be anything new to you,” she replies.

“So, just a handful of really well trained female warriors then?”

“Yep and maybe the shadowy power that made you, but I think that power wants you to stay alive.”

“I feel so much better knowing this,” he says, sarcasm dripping from every word.

“You should. It’s always good to know your enemy and to be prepared. Alert.”

“I know where this is going. You think we’re careless.”

“I think you’re young,” she answers, kissing his forehead.

He sighs, but keeps silent.

~+~  
“She’s planning something,” Dimitri says. He is sure Emilia has a plan and he bets it’s a good one. He just would like to know what kind of collateral damage there will be.

“Yeah, I think that too,” Andrej answers. He’s barefoot and his toenails are painted in a dark purple colour. It looks like his toes are bruised a bit. Makes his feet look strangely vulnerable.

“I don’t like this.”

“Me neither, and William is beginning to feel restless. I think he needs to feed badly.”

“I don’t want to hear about this. Every fibre in my body wants to slit his throat when I think about it. Don’t get me wrong I like him, strangely enough, but I can’t just switch it off like that. I was trained to hunt them down, to kill them.”

“You might get your wish,” William says entering the kitchen. He kisses Andrej’s cheek and grabs the mug Andrej is holding out for him. It all looks disgustingly domestic.

“You think they’ll come for us soon?”

“Emilia thinks so, that’s good enough for me,” he answers, sitting down next to Dimitri. There is this pull again. It’s always stronger when they’re close. He needs to get to the bottom of this.

~+~  
Dimitri has his mom mail him all the books on vampires they have in their library and the journals as well. He didn’t tell anyone that the family also has vampire diaries. Picked up and kept safe when they cleaned out rooms and houses.  
The stuff arrives on a Saturday morning. Andrej opens the door in only a t-shirt and something that looks like girl-panties. Dimitri shakes his head and grins at the UPS-guy who stutters his way through the delivery.

“Yeah, sure, I’ll take it. He lives here too,” Andrej yawns with his pretty mouth covered. His hair falling in long pale strands over his back. “Sorry”, he smiles, signs the delivery, and takes the package.

“Let me,” Dimitri says, taking it from his hands.

“What the hell did your mom send you?” Andrej asks.

“Books.”

“I was hoping for cookies.”

“I know her, she sent some cookies as well.”

Andrej’s face lights up. He looks like he’ll rip that package open just to get to them first. “I’ll make some tea.” He says, disappearing into the kitchen. Dimitri brings the whole thing to the living room. He’ll need help to sort through this. He takes the bag of cookies, a bit crumpled, but he’s sure they’ll taste delicious anyway and joins Andrej in the kitchen.

“Oh, good, the raisin ones. I love these the most!”

“I know. And mama knows too, she remembers.”

“I think she liked to let me play dress up in her bedroom.”

“She loved it. I bet she would love to let you play dress up in her bedroom still,” Dimitri answers. “She always wanted a daughter.”

“Aww,” Andrej says with an easy laugh. “So what else did your mom send you?”

“Books, I told you.”

“Yes, I know, but what kind of books I bet it’s not Twilight parts one to four.”

“And can you believe this shit?” Dimitri asks and then laughs out loud. “I am in my own personal Twilight version.”

“The gay version,” Andrej says.

“The polygamous version.”

“Nah, William has only slept with Emilia more than once and I’m not sleeping with anyone right now. You?”

“No time for such distractions.”

“Right with a war at hand and all. So the books?”

“You know how William feels wrong? Somehow? Just different? Like he even smells wrong?”

“Yeah.”

“I need to get to the bottom of this. Whoever made him. Made him different and the other vampires don’t seem to see it.”

“Because they can’t sniff each other out,” Andrej says, taking a cookie out of the bag. “Delicious.”

“You kind of eat obscenely, you know that?”

“Tom keeps telling me that,” Andrej admits with a smile.  
Dimitri shakes his head.

~+~  
“So, you got a bunch of books about vampires and you have books written by vampires?” William asks.

“We kind of found them. Most of them are in languages none of us can speak, so they’re lying around.”

“But now that you have two vampires here, you think you can read this stuff?”

“I know that Emilia can speak at least ten languages,” Dimitri says.

“Well, she had enough time on her hands to learn them.”

Dimitri grins. “And you didn’t?”

“I was having freak outs and then I was busy having sex.”

Dimitri laughs. “I believe that in a heartbeat.”

“Yours or mine?” William asks and it sounds like flirting.

Dimitri shakes his head; he can’t be distracted by this. He is a Hunter, William is his prey, and well, all bets are off, because Andrej fucked up the order of things, but he still at least tries to be professional about this whole thing. William should be too.

“Don’t do that,” he says.

“What?”

“Tempt me, I am as poisonous as he is. And it would make Andrej cry.”

“So you are tempted?” William asks and it sounds a bit like a purr. Fuck this shit, Dimitri thinks. He throws a book at William.

“Read! We are going to war. Soon.”  
William sighs, but opens the book.

~+~  
Emilia is dressed in a light blue shirt and a long white skirt when she enters the living room with coffee in her hands and bagels for the living. Andrej loves her. He really does and he wants to know where she got that shirt from, because it would look awesome on him too.

“You’re home late,” William says, without looking up. She puts the coffee onto the small coffee table.

“I was planning our battle and meeting with spies. You?”

“We are reading boring as shit vampire journals. It’s all about fucking and eating in here,” he waves a journal at her. “Also betraying his wife. We marry?”

“If we want to,” she shrugs, sitting down.

“There is a pile we can’t read, because none of us understands the languages,” Dimitri points out.

She nods. “Sure. Why are we doing this?”

“Because I think, we think, that the vampire who made William made him wrong.”

“You can’t make a vampire wrong. There is only one way and it always works,” she answers with a raised eyebrow.

“Yeah, maybe, but something about him smells different and feels different as well. He is different than you and other vampires.”

“Yeah, he has a dick,” she says, amused.

“Besides that. Trust us on that one. He is…well, it’s like there is a thread inside him that doesn’t belong,” Dimitri tries to explain.

“Oh,” she answers and William’s eyes shift to her face.

“Oh?”

“Well…there were rumours. I told you.”

“You think someone actually tried this Underworld crap?” The _on me_ goes unsaid.

“Dimitri just said you smell wrong and he has to know.”

“Not like a werewolf,” Dimitri rolls his eyes at them.

Andrej looks at him. “Not like a werewolf? How can you say it that casually?”

“What! There are werewolves out there?” William throws in.

“There are _things_ out there-“

“And you can smell them out? I mean feel them?” William interrupts.

Dimitri throws a book at him. “I am a trained Hunter. Of course I can feel everything that isn’t human around me. Not everything is evil.”

“Are there unicorns?” William asks.

“If there are you won’t see one anyway,” Dimitri answers with a smirk.

“Bastard.”

“Read,” Dimitri says.

~+~  
Later William is very aware that Emilia didn’t answer his question. He doesn’t like it. Not one bit.  
It’s fucked up if someone was messing with his DNA or whatever. He has actually no clue how all this works to be honest and he doesn’t want to know these things. Tried to make him a monster, a hybrid and for what?  
War?  
A new order of things?  
Because that bastard wants to be a modern Frankenstein?  
He doesn’t like to think about this possibility, but he knows Emilia is thinking about it.

 

~6~  
“I hope her game-plan is good,” Dimitri says sitting down on the edge of Andrej’s bed.

“I trust her, she could have killed me a long time ago.”  
And maybe that would have been better than the mess we’re in now, Dimitri thinks and hates himself for it a second later. That’s his father speaking. Things aren’t any more like they were fifty, hundred years ago. The world is changing and he doesn’t say _let them do what they want_ , but he isn’t sure it’s okay to kill those of them who try to live a normal life.

“The funny thing is, I trust her too and I know she keeps secrets,” Dimitri answers.

“Everyone keeps secrets. You too.”

Dimitri can hear Andrej shift on the bed, sitting up from the lying position he was in a bit ago. Yeah, he thinks, since I saw you that one morning of my arrival I am keeping secrets like they’re my favourite candy.

“I know. Doesn’t make it better. I just hope it isn’t anything important.”

“Something that would get us killed you mean?”

“Something that would get you killed,” Dimitri answers.

“Well, thank you!” Andrej punches him on the arm lightly and Dimitri laughs.

“You are aware that I could have stopped you, right?” he answers, turning his head to look at Andrej. His hair is a mess again. He looks like he just got up.

“I can hold my own,” Andrej answers shrugging.  
Dimitri wishes he could be so sure.

~+~  
Emilia finds the journal after the boys go to bed. She can’t sleep anyway and why not do some more reading? It can only help. Besides she reads faster than humans and she knows more languages.  
It’s an old journal. Maybe three hundred years and what she finds there, she really doesn’t like.  
William was right when he was joking about the whole Underworld thing. Sebastian was trying to breed hybrids, but it didn’t work. Not for at least hundred years and the things they did to newborn vampires. She puts the journal aside, she’s just that disgusted by its content. Emilia is sure that Bryan picked up where Sebastian left off. Maybe they were even working together at some point? She can’t prove this of course. The journal has nothing personal in it. It’s just report after report of his failures. In great detail.  
She is glad he at least had the decency to kill the poor things afterwards.  
She sighs, she has to tell them. She has to tell what she thinks they tried to do. What she thinks Bryan tried to do before she killed him.  
It’s so clear now to her. It makes perfect sense. William is a kind of weapon. She is glad she never drank his blood. What the fuck, seriously.  
And what if there are others like him out there? How did he even survive this?  
She shakes her head.  
Fuck.

“What are you doing here this late?” Dimitri asks with a yawn.

“Reading up on freaky experiments.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. And you?”

“Couldn’t sleep. The whole William thing,” he waves his hand in a non-descript gesture. “I have a theory and I don’t like it.”

She cocks her head. “Spit it out.”  
He leans against the door-frame and lights a cigarette. She is sure he would’ve smoked on the small balcony if he wouldn’t have found her here sitting on the floor.

“He smells wrong and he is kind of tempting, right?”

She nods. “Yes. That’s what you said. I have to trust you on that.”

“He is tempting to us, like Andrej is tempting to you. Andrej wasn’t freaked out by him, hell I wasn’t even freaked out by him that much. You said there were experiments and it got me thinking. What would be the best weapon against vampires?”

She nods. “Poisonous blood,” she says.

“Yes, poisonous blood. I think he is infected with it. He might be the only vampire who could survive drinking a Hunter’s blood,” he closes, taking a deep drag of his cigarette. “But you came to the same conclusion, didn’t you?”

“After reading Sebastian’s journal, yes. I think he was designed, somehow to kill other vampires. A side-effect might be that he could survive drinking Hunter blood, because it’s in his system already.”

“How the hell could someone do that in the first place? Not that it isn’t kind of brilliant.”

“If he were trained he could’ve been a really good killer, you know?” she asks.

He nods. “I bet he is a really good killer now too.”

“We only feed, we don’t assassinate people. Everyone has to eat.” She is tired and has no desire to get into an argument with him. He takes another drag.

“I know. I don’t kill all the vampires I encounter or even sense. Most of you are adjusting pretty well.”

“We try. It was easier to be a monster without the internet,” she answers whirly.

It surprises a laugh out of him. “Are you going to tell him?”

“William? Or Andrej?”

“What does it matter?”

She sighs. “Yeah, I’m going to tell them. First thing tomorrow.”

~+~  
“You look like you didn’t sleep at all,” Andrej says instead of a nice and cheerful ‘good morning’.

“It’s because I didn’t sleep,” Dimitri answers.  
Andrej nods and pours water into the kettle. He has a bad feeling about this day. Dimitri looks really exhausted and like he wants to tell him he only has two days to live.

“Coffee or tea?” he asks.

“Is that a trick question?” Dimitri answers.

Andrej smiles. “Not really.”

“Where’s William? He usually stalks the shadows at this hour and listens in on our conversations.”

“He went out to buy us breakfast.”

“You know the funny thing is, the first few times I was so sure he would poison my bagel or muffin,” Dimitri answers.

“You know it is funny, because I was thinking about it a few times,” William answers.

“Jesus! I didn’t even hear the freaking door open.”

“I’m a ninja,” William says, putting a bag with breakfast on the table.

“I’m glad you don’t want to kill each other anymore,” Andrej throws in, preparing coffee and tea for William.

“So, what’s with the grave vibes?”

“Emilia and I had a chat last night,” Dimitri says.

“Where is she anyway?”

“Meeting her secret spy, of course,” Dimitri answers.

“Okay…” Andrej puts mugs with fresh coffee and tea on the table and sits down.

“I will not like this, will I?” William asks, taking a mug.

“Depends, it’s not all bad,” Dimitri answers.

Andrej takes a deep calming breath. “Okay, just tell us.”

“…and that’s why we think your blood could poison other vampires,” Dimitri finishes his explanation.  
William clutches his mug so hard that Andrej thinks it’s going to break. He closes his fingers around one of William’s hands and squeezes lightly.

“You have any idea how they did it?” William asks. “Or how many others like me are out there, but trained to be soldiers? Killers?”

“No, that’s what Emilia is trying to find out,” Dimitri answers. It seems to Andrej like he’s waiting for something. Andrej sure as hell is waiting for William to ask the important question.

“He could survive drinking my blood?” he asks in a whisper and William looks at him like he’s crazy.

“Maybe. He has it in his system, but we don’t know anything yet,” Dimitri answers carefully. William pulls his hands away from Andrej’s.

“Don’t even think about it, it’s crazy,” William says, an edge in his voice.  
Andrej crosses his arms over his thin chest. This is so not the last word on that matter for him.

 

~7~  
“Because that’s crazy!” William says, taking a violent drag of his cigarette.

“Think about it!”

“I am thinking about it with my brain, are you?” William answers sharply.

Andrej balls his hands to fists. “This is not about me wanting to get laid,” he says his voice carefully blank.

“Yeah, right. What is it about then?” William wants to know.

“About us being together. I want to know if we can be together because of this.”

“Because of me being a designer weapon?” William says sharply. He hates this. He hates that he has to bury not only his hope but Andrej’s too. They don’t know if he could survive this and what if he doesn’t? He doesn’t want to die, he doesn’t want Andrej to feel guilty because of it. He is freaking afraid of even having the possibility and then there are the shadow men who made him and want him back for sure. They can’t hide out here at the end of the world forever. Sooner or later someone will find them and drag William off to be tested and experimented on. Maybe he really needs to stop watching all those horror movies.

Andrej takes a sharp breath. “It’s like you don’t even want to try.”

“I don’t want to try. I could die in the process!” William answers. “And for what? A few fleeting years?”

The hurt on Andrej’s face nearly makes him want to take the words back, but they’re true. Andrej could never be with him forever. He’s human and he will never be anything else.  
Andrej bites his lip until it whites out. William watches the blood drain and push away from his teeth. In moments like this he just wants to forget everything and drag Andrej to the bed. He wishes he had better control over himself, but he doesn’t. He always slips and always bites. He tried in the years they lived apart, he tried to control this urge to mark and claim, but he couldn’t. Maybe no vampire can.

~+~  
“You fucked up, hmm?” Emilia asks.

“It’s not like they found a freaking cure!” William answers hotly.

“But it is a possibility to be with him. He sees it as the chance it could be, William. You love him,” she adds softly.

“It doesn’t matter. Me being here is a mistake. We shouldn’t have come.”

“Then we wouldn’t know anything. I always preferred knowledge to the alternative.”

“Ignorance is sometimes bliss.”

“Ignorance is never bliss, William,” Emilia answers firmly.

“You ever consider how I feel about this?”

“Yes, every moment. But it doesn’t change a thing just because you don’t want to deal with it. They made you wrong. You are different from us and you escaped, or they fucked up on a field test. Whatever the reason, you got away and I am sure they want you back now that they know you made it.”

“I hate secret societies and I especially hate secret, crazy vampire societies who experiment with newborns.”

“You and me both.”

“So you think this Sebastian guy is still alive?”

“No.”

“You killed him too?”

“No, but someone I know did, so I am sure he is dead.”

“We have no suspects then.”

“Not any who are alive,” Emilia says.

“Great, just…great.”

~+~  
Things between Andrej and William are strained to put it mildly. Andrej doesn’t talk about it, but he is writing into his notebook furiously. He is also drinking too much coffee and posing in his favourite dresses in front of the mirror in Emilia’s room.

“I need to go out,” he declares on Friday.

“Are you crazy?” William asks.

“I might be tempted to poison your coffee right now,” he answers sweetly and William glares at him.

“You should go out then,” Emilia says calmly.

“I knew that you were crazy,” William snaps.

She gives him a look. “It might be good to get out of the house for a while. You need to feed. You’re getting intolerable. More and more so with every passing minute.”

“I’m going with,” Dimitri says.

“I’m going to wear a dress and heels,” Andrej warns.

“I’ve seen you wear them. In fact, the day I arrived here I saw you in a dress. You can’t surprise me.”

Andrej smiles, slow and wicked. “You shouldn’t bet on it.”

~+~  
You wouldn’t guess he’s a boy if you didn’t know. Dimitri knows it, but it still caught him off guard when Andrej emerged from his room dressed in a short silky dress and high heels. The material is clearly expensive. His hair shiny, wild curls framing his face. His face touched up with make-up a bit. His lips shiny from pale gloss.

“You can be my girlfriend for tonight,” he said and Andrej had laughed.  
They both ignored William chain-smoking on the balcony.

~+~  
The club is packed and Andrej is king – or queen -- of it. Andrej is just going with the music and the endless parade of strangers that want to buy him drinks. He’s very aware of Dimitri watching him. He can take care of himself. He is a trained Hunter now, although with not much experience and is in love with a vampire, but- yeah, fuck. He is so not thinking about it now. Thing is, he doesn’t mind Dimitri watching, he doesn’t mind at all. He knows Dimitri cares about him, maybe even cares about William now too, because William cares as well. Andrej doubts a lot of things, but he doesn’t doubt that.  
A hand snakes around his waist and he lets it, lets the stranger pull him in, moves with him, and closes his eyes. Nothing can happen here.  
He always felt safe wearing a dress in a crowd of strangers.

~+~  
He’s having a smoke outside with some random guy he might go home with for a few hours when Dimitri finds him.

“Oh, fuck, here you are. I was worried.”

“Dimitri,” he says, handing his cigarette over. Dimitri looks like he could use it. “Something happened?”

“Except you just freaking disappearing?” he answers, but he doesn’t seem that angry.

“I was thinking about going home with Jeff here,” Andrej answers.

Dimitri gives Jeff a once over. “He doesn’t look like William,” he states, exhaling smoke.

“That’s the point,” Andrej answers, but he knows he is not going home with Jeff anymore. He maybe never really considered it in earnest anyway.

“You’re coming home with me,” Dimitri says, grabbing his hand and pulling a bit.

“Hey,” Jeff throws in.

“You know he’s a guy, right?” Dimitri answers.

“I was just getting to that part, Dimitri. You spoiled it,” Andrej answers, leaning against him.

“Oh, so sorry…” Dimitri says, his voice dripping with sarcasm and dragging Andrej with him. Andrej smiles, he knows Dimitri would do something stupid now, because he is a bit angry, so he’s glad Jeff just shrugs it off. Maybe he isn’t one to forget he doesn’t actually like dick – no matter how feminine and hot the guy looks in a dress. And Andrej looks pretty hot in a dress.

~+~  
They stumble into the house at four a.m. and really try to be quiet, but it doesn’t work. Well, maybe Andrej doesn’t try that hard, maybe it’s all Dimitri. Andrej is drunk like he wasn’t in a long time anymore and Dimitri just finds it hilarious.  
They fall on the couch together, Andrej snuggling close to him.

“You are really stupid sometimes,” Dimitri says.

“I am really stupid most of the time when it comes to him, you know,” Andrej mumbles into his collarbone. He suppresses a shiver.

“Yeah, I know.”

“If you’re okay with it, I could be your boyfriend tonight,” Andrej whispers, there is an slight emphasis on the word _boyfriend_ , and his hot breath ghosts over Dimitri’s skin.

“I don’t look like him either,” Dimitri says, but he isn’t pushing Andrej away.

“No, you don’t.”

“Go to bed,” he answers after a while. This is just not a good idea in any universe.

“I want to put my blood in his coffee, you know? I really think about it at night when I can’t sleep…” Andrej confesses.  
Dimitri pulls him into a hug and doesn’t say it will be okay. He doesn’t know that, no one does.

 

~8~  
William is really freaking tired of waiting for the bad guys to find him or to snatch Andrej away when he goes out. He can’t make Andrej stay in the country house all the time, he knows that, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to do just that. Lock the door and throw the key away.  
He’s smoking on the balcony when Emilia finds him. There is blood on her shirt. He hopes Dimitri didn’t see it. It’s strange how they try to be themselves without being too obvious about it. He always thought she would hate that, but she seems okay.

“Waiting makes you cranky,” she says, leaning on the railing.

“Everything makes me cranky these days. I need to get laid.”

She turns to him and smiles. “You certainly do.”

“Are you offering?”

“I might, but I know you’ll want someone with a dick right now. Maybe you should go out as well and find someone with a death wish.”

He laughs. “This is not Interview With the Vampire.” He takes a deep drag of his smoke. “You know we can’t do this.”

“I really wish we could read people’s minds,” she says wistful.

“Yeah, things would be so much easier if we could, but the dark gift and all that…”

“Yeah, basically we’re all the same.”

“Except for me.”

“Except for you,” she answers. “Get out, feed, get laid. I don’t like you much when you’re a cranky bitch.”

“I don’t like me much either when I’m a cranky bitch,” he says, exhaling smoke. She kisses his cheek and leaves him alone.  
He really needs to eat something. Lately even Dimitri looks delicious to him. But maybe it’s because he’s Andrej’s family.  
Which is all kinds of fucked-up.

~+~  
Dimitri is drinking Vodka O and trying to look like he isn’t watching every one of Andrej’s moves (which are dirty, dirty, dirty and he is wearing a ‘I want to get laid’ dress) when he feels it. It’s a tingle at the back of his neck. He scans the room. In a corner, not far away from Andrej is a vampire. Andrej turns his head slightly, nodding once – it looks like he’s swaying to the beat. He’s seen him too. Dimitri fires a short text to Emilia and waits. Watching. Could be nothing. Could be something. You can never be too careful around vampires.  
Andrej’s dancing like nothing can shake him, maybe after the whole William thing really nothing can shake him. Dimitri doesn’t know. They don’t have many hearts to hearts.  
Dimitri is watching the vampire. Long-limbed and with short dark hair. He would say it’s a woman, but after meeting Andrej and hell, even William would look like a girl if he wore make-up and a dress in a dark club. He’s feeling on edge and wishes he didn’t leave his knife in the car.  
He watches Andrej flirt with the vampire and is nearly ready to choke him for his stupid behaviour. They should leave right the fuck now and not play bait.

~+~  
Andrej knows that vampires don’t really care about the gender they eat, maybe about the gender they fuck, but they’re not that picky when it comes to food. He also knows that Dimitri will follow them outside and if Andrej should be in danger Dimitri will kill the vampire.  
The surprising thing’s when they start to make out and it feels really fucking good, another surprising thing is that that under the dress? Is totally a hard-on.

“You lied,” Andrej says laughing against his lips.

“You’re one to talk,” the guy replies. He’s really pretty and has great lips and Andrej really, really wants to make out with him some more. He hopes that guy doesn’t want to bite him. It would be a shame. “You smell delicious.” The guy’s teeth graze his skin.

“You really shouldn’t do that,” Andrej sighs.

It makes the guy stop and look at him. “I should not do what?”

“Bite me.”

The guy cocks his head and looks at Andrej. “You _do_ smell delicious, you know?”

“Yes. I do.”

The guy takes a step back. “Well, fuck. You’re one of them.” He rakes a hand through his hair, just standing there looking at Andrej.

“You have pretty lips.”

“Are you drunk? Are you stupid?” the vampire asks.

“No, but you won’t bite me, so…”

“I could kill you with my bare hands!” The guy gives back sharply, throwing his hands up.  
Andrej giggles. The dress is short and frilly and felt really good against Andrej’s inner thigh. The material dragging against his skin “You are insane, aren’t you?”

“Maybe,” Andrej answers, throwing his head back and resting it against the wall. “But seriously, what do you expect? I’m poisonous.”

“Only to my kind.”

“Yeah, I know…” Andrej answers.

“The fuck Andrej!” Dimitri yells, his knife in hand.

“It’s cool. He is one of the good guys, I think.”

“The good guys, seriously? And wait. He?”

“A boy. Loves to wear dresses, just like me,” Andrej answers.

“Not exactly…” the vampire throws in. Dimitri’s eyes snap in his direction.

“Someone warned you about the females only rule, hmm?” he asks, he has still his knife out and looks like he’s ready to kill someone. Maybe even me, Andrej thinks.

“Yeah.”

“I think we should talk,” Andrej says.

~+~  
They find a café close to the club, a hole in the wall thing with a tired looking waitress and order coffee. Dimitri has put away his knife, but he still seems on edge. Maybe because he’s sitting at a table with two guys in dresses. If it weren’t a very bad idea, Andrej would snigger, but it would be such a very bad idea to make Dimitri mad right now.

“So, talk then,” Dimitri says.

“He’s the rude one, right?” the vampire asks.

“Not always. He gets shit done, though. I’m Andrej and that’s Dimitri,” he answers, swirling his hair around a finger. He is still kind of horny; the left over excitement licking at him and curling in his stomach.

“Alec.” He smiles at Andrej and Andrej smiles back. Dimitri rolls his eyes at them, but Dimitri just likes to roll his eyes at anyone. The waitress brings the coffee and when she’s gone, Dimitri pours sugar into it like tomorrow will start a zombie-apocalypse and takes a sip.

“Okay, Alec. You know you are not really supposed to exist?” Dimitri asks.

Alec nods, taking a sip of his black coffee. “Yeah. They told me the day I was made.”

“You remember anything about that?”

“Sure.”

Andrej has a suspicion. “You aren’t old, are you?”

“Three weeks a vampire.”

“And you know a lot of shit. William didn’t know a lot of shit. He didn’t know anything.”

Dimitri nods. “Yeah, suspicious much?”

“What are we talking about?” Alec asks.

“You having all the facts and being a spy for the shadow men.”

Alec laughs. “What?” Andrej looks at him. “You guys are serious about this shit,” he realises.

“You don’t smell different, though,” Dimitri throws in.

“Okay, so who made you?”

“Uhm, a chick I was dating for some time…”

“How long is a while?”

“Since I was 15.”

“And you are now?” Andrej asks. Alec looks like he’s barely 20.

“24,” Alec says.

“Holy shit,” Dimitri says.

Andrej doesn’t think Alec is an agent for the shadow men. “Okay…”

“So, wanna tell me what the hell is going on?” Alec wants to know.

“I like your dress,” Andrej answers. He really likes Alec’s dress.

Alec laughs. “You can have it.”

Andrej beams at him and Dimitri looks like he wants to choke a bitch.

~+~  
William is pissed off when he hears all about Alec and what Andrej did. He is so freaking jealous it’s not even funny. He was out, he fed and he wanted to get laid, but he couldn’t find the right person and he is not allowed to kill anyone right now.  
He’s chain smoking on the balcony again and thinking about hunting down a deer or something just to feel blood spill over his skin, feel soft entrails between his fingers. Thinking about it makes him hungry and horny. Well, fuck.  
He takes a violent drag of his cigarette and keeps it in his lungs until they protest. It takes 12 minutes for them to protest. He knows he can’t die of a lack of oxygen, but it isn’t a pleasant feeling either. His body would just slow down and try to cope. Maybe that would be a welcome change. He doesn’t want to deal with the jealousy and rage right now.  
He decides to stay out here on the balcony a bit longer, until he feels like he can deal again. He has a suspicion that it could take all night.

 

~9~  
William gives him the cold shoulder and freaking looks the whole morning until Andrej snaps.

“Is this about Alec?”

“Are you going to fuck every vampire now?” William asks.

“No, only the males,” Andrej answers sharply.

William’s fingers grab the edge of the table so hard the wood cracks. Great, Andrej thinks. He got this table from his grandmother. He loves that table.  
“Not funny.”

“Do you see me laughing? Because I’m not. And I’m not freaking interested in girls either, you should know that by now.”

“Don’t do this,” William says, his voice only a whisper.

“Don’t do what?”

“Don’t tempt me.”

“We could work and you are too scared to try!” Andrej explodes.

“We could never work, because you’re going to die!”

Andrej takes a deep breath. It doesn’t really help to calm him down. “So, you don’t want to try because it wouldn’t be forever?” he asks. “That’s just stupid! Not even vampires stay together forever. You said it yourself you aren’t a cuddly bunch.”

William sighs, leaning back into the chair, closing his eyes. “It’s not only that. You are just so freaking fragile.”

“That is my charm, William,” Andrej says softly, touching his cheek with his fingertips.  
William’s eyes snap open. He grabs Andrej’s wrist and holds it there in midair like he doesn’t know what to do with it.

“You don’t give up, do you?”

Andrej shakes his head. He doesn’t, he won’t. He leans down slowly, the grip on his wrist tightens, it’s nearly painful, but William doesn’t push him away.  
“You can say no now,” Andrej whispers against his lips and William’s lips curve into a smile. A real one.

“I know,” he says just before their lips meet.  
The kiss is gentle and careful, just lips touching lips softly. Andrej doesn’t want to make it into something hard and demanding and hungry. It would fuck them up for sure.

“Okay…that was good, wasn’t it?” Andrej asks after a while. His wrist is hurting. He is sure he’ll have bruises. The Hunter thing doesn’t come with super healing powers like in Buffy, which sucks a lot to be honest.

“Yes,” William answers, licking his lip. “But it won’t stay that way.”  
Andrej kisses his cheek. He knows that.

~+~  
Emilia comes home three days later and looks like death warmed over. There is a small cut on her arm and a bruise on her cheek.

“You got into a fight?” William asks. He’s stunned, just standing in the door, mug in one hand, cigarette in the other.

“Thank you Captain Obvious,” she answers tiredly.

“I mean…with who the fuck did you get into a fight?” William wants to know. No way could a human did that to her.

“Barbara,” she answers.

“Your spy?” Dimitri asks.

She nods. “Yes, my spy and _friend_ Barbara.”

“Okay, I’m making coffee, you will sit down on the comfy couch we have and then you will tell us why you’re fighting with your childhood sweetheart,” Dimitri orders.

She nods, smiling at him. “Sounds like a plan.”

“I’m a great planner.”

~+~  
The coffee warms her and the boys distract her from the pain in her body. It heals itself, but it still hurts like hell. She sinks further into the comfy couch and closes her eyes for a few seconds. Just listening to the boys putter around.

She takes a deep breath. “Barbara thinks I’m insane.”

“You are insane,” William supplies. She opens her eyes to look at him. He’s smiling, but she already knew that: Could hear it in his voice.

Emilia smiles back. “I know, for keeping you and also now this Alec kid. Barbara heard rumours about male vampires, but no one listens to rumours anymore in our community. They’re more like scary bedtime stories for young vampires.”

“Okay?” Dimitri prompts.

“She found out they aren’t. She found out what we found out and she thinks every male vampire with the ability to kill one of their, our, own by sharing blood – it’s the most erotic and sacred thing for a vampire – should be killed. No questions asked.”

“Yeah, I can see why you’re not on board with that plan,” Dimitri throws in. He lights a cigarette and inhales deeply. He has pretty lips she thinks. Like Andrej’s they look really soft.

“She’s scared,” Emilia answers. “And she should be. I am scared too. If the shadow men have an army now…I don’t want to think about it.”

“Are there vampires missing?” Dimitri asks.

She nods. “Yes and that is another reason why she’s scared. Only a few are missing and we don’t know where all of them are at any given time, but that is not reassuring.”

“No, it’s really not.”

“They’re picking us off one by one and we didn’t know about it and now…” she trails off.

“You think we’re on a brink of another war,” Dimitri clarifies.

She gives him a look. “ _We_ are, you aren’t. This is not your fight or Andrej’s for that matter. No humans are involved here.”

“We aren’t ordinary humans, we’re Hunters.”  
She rolls her eyes and is up in a flash, pinning him down to the floor. Her teeth inches away from his neck. He shudders, she can feel it, but keeps perfectly still.

“You are still humans and they will kill you for being Hunters.”

“We care, Emilia,” he says softly, but firmly.

She lets him go and stands up. “I know. Still. I don’t want you to be part of this.”

“It’s a bit late for that,” he answers from the hard wood floor. “You fucked me up, badly.”

She looks down on him. Into his pretty green eyes and thinks, yeah, we really did.

 

~10~  
Andrej disappears without a word two days later and Emilia just knows that the shadow men found them. She hoped it wouldn’t come to that. She really did, but well, now they have to deal with it. William is so pissed off she doesn’t even want to talk to him. He has been glaring at the wall and chain-smoking for an hour now. Dimitri is sharpening his knives in a corner.  
She hates waiting for the other party to make a move.  
She knows they will. She knows the shadow men know all about Andrej by now. Know how much he means to William. There is no way they can play this any other way.  
Dimitri puts his knife away and looks at her. Not accusing, she was afraid for a bit that he would blame her, blame them, but it seems it’s not his nature.

“I hate waiting,” he says and William’s head snaps in his direction. She knows he is about to say something stupid and horrible and just plain mean, so she grabs his arm hard.

“Me too,” she answers.

“Why aren’t they sending notes already to meet them and have a hostage exchange or whatever?”

“Because they like to play with us. It makes them feel powerful,” she replies.

“I bet they like playing with Andrej as well,” William says softly. His voice is barely there at all. He is shaking with wrath and worry.

Dimitri balls his hands to fists and Emilia is pretty sure he’s going to punch the wall any second now. He takes a deep breath and relaxes.  
“I don’t need to hear that,” he answers.

“Dimitri,” she says softly.

“Okay…okay,” he replies, but she isn’t sure what the hell he means.

~+~  
Once things start, they progress really fast. It always happens like that. The shadow men call, because this is the 21st Century and a bloody rag or an ear isn’t necessary anymore. Some people still use a finger or something to get their point across, but these people don’t need to demonstrate what they are capable off. They already did by creating William.  
The boys are hovering around her. She pushes the loud-speaker button. Better to have them in on everything. Dimitri is a trained Hunter, there might be things he could get from this conversation, she won’t because she’ll be too distracted talking to that scumbag that stole Andrej from them.

“Emilia,” the smooth voice on the other end says and she knows that voice. Knows it and it chills her to her bones.

“Tobias,” she answers.

“You remember me. I am so pleased.”

“I remember your brother better,” she replies sweetly. She just can’t help herself. It is a bad idea to provoke a psycho vampire who should be dead and whose brother she killed herself, but well. She doesn’t think he can get any more bat-shit crazy than he is now anyway.

“Of course you do. You slit his throat and cut out his heart and spilled his blood on his marble floor.”

“It was ugly,” she says.

“The floor? Yes, he never had a real sense for style,” Tobias admits.  
She balls her hand at her side until she can’t feel anything except the pain. It helps her to concentrate.

“I thought you were dead too,” she says.

“That was what I wanted you lot to think.”

“So you could create a weapon in the meantime.”

“And it took me centuries.” He sighs. “It’s so typical for my life that you found him. You of all vampires. The one that wouldn’t bite and I bet you fucked that pretty boy more than once.”  
She hates it when people get vulgar from one second to the next – it’s only fun when you’re having sex.

“ _He_ sure as hell knows what he’s doing with his mouth,” she answers.  
She can hear him inhale sharply. Emilia isn’t sure if he’s pissed off right now or turned on. She thinks turned on would be worse. Urgh. Better not to think about it.

“We have your Hunter,” he says calmly.

“I know. I know you already played with him. I remember your brother’s favourite pastime so well, Tobi,” she replies, sweetly.

Another sharp intake of breath. This time definitely angry. “I remember you watching.”

She bites her lip. She was young back then, but she never enjoyed it. “Why are we still talking around it? You want William and you know I won’t give him to you.”

He laughs. “But that is not your decision, is it? Does the council know you were hiding a weapon that could kill them all? Don’t answer. Of course they don’t know. He is mine and I have something he wants. I even can understand why. This Hunter is a very pretty one. I wanted to bite him the second they brought him in. He smells delicious. Did William fuck him?”  
She can feel William tense beside her. He lights a cigarette and inhales deeply. “Is that a no? How could he resist such a pretty thing?” Tobias asks, real curiosity in his voice. “I did.”  
William punches the wall beside the window so hard the glass rattles.  
She doesn’t even blink. Dimitri doesn’t either.

“Stop talking and tell me where you want to meet,” she answers, her voice cold.

“Why the rush all of a sudden. Don’t you want to know if he’s still alive? Don’t you want a proof of life?”

“I know you didn’t kill him,” she replies and she does know that. She knows Tobias, as long as he can play and fuck with everyone’s heads he will.

“You are no fun.”

“You’re not the first one to tell me that,” she says.

“I’ll text you the details. Say hi to my boy, would you?” he answers and hangs up before she can tell him to go to hell.

~+~  
“So, you killed his brother?” Dimitri asks. He is smoking his third cigarette in five minutes.

“He, Bryan, wasn’t Tobias’ real brother…” she answers.

“I don’t particularly care,” he says. “Bryan is dead, you killed him, Tobias is still alive-“

“He should be dead,” she throws in.

“So some Underworld crap then, whatever. I don’t care. Someone lied and it comes back to bite us in the arse. Nothing new. Happens all the freaking time. What I want to know is what we’re doing to make sure that this time he stays dead,” he continues, lighting another cigarette.

“Well, first we’re trying to stop William from doing something stupid and then we’re going to kill them all.”

“Call Barbara, I bet she knows who fucked up badly all these years ago.”

“I have a suspicion myself,” she answers.

 

~11~  
It’s always easier said than done, the whole _kill them all_ thing.

“You knew!” Emilia yells.

“I didn’t know it was Tobias, okay? And I loved her, I couldn’t…” Barbara crosses her arms over her chest and doesn’t look at her. “I mean, she only said her brother. Could have been anyone. I didn’t know.”

Emilia sighs. “And you told her to tell her brother to go underground and never asked another question.”

“We never spoke about it,” she confirms. “I didn’t know.”

“Well, it’s too late for that now. We need to find Andrej – it doesn’t matter if he is alive or not – we need to stop Tobias and we need to kill every single one of the poisonous vampires he made.”

“Except yours.”

“Except mine, of course. I know he won’t fuck up and go on a killing spree. He wasn’t raised with lies about us.”  
Barbara gives her a look. Emilia stares right back. Not telling is not the same as lying. “You in or what?”

“We aren’t going to tell the council about this, are we?” Barbara asks.

“No. They can never know about William and how badly you fucked up with Tobias. Tobias, Barbara.”

She nods. “We will need a bit of help.”

“I have William and Dimitri.”

“Dimitri is human.”

“And poisonous,” Emilia answers.

“We need more weapons and we need more than the four of us.”

“Who else is going to fight?”

“Let me call a few people,” she answers.

Emilia nods. Barbara knows her shit, she will find the three people who don’t care, or care enough to help them. Emilia is sure of that.

~+~  
“People we don’t know?” Dimitri asks.

“Who the hell cares? I want to go there and get Andrej right the fuck now.”

“And get yourself and maybe Andrej killed in the process,” Dimitri shoots back.  
William glares, exhaling smoke and then taking another deep drag. He is a wreck and he knows it. He can’t forget Tobias’s words. He can’t forget that he tortured Andrej and worse. He wants to kill the bastard with his own hands.

“Dimitri,” Emilia says softly and William is glad she’s here. Is glad that she can keep her cool, hates it right now, but a part of him knows that their chances are higher to survive this with her being professional and emotionless about this.  
God knows he can’t be.

“Fine! But I don’t like that we have to wait until tomorrow to get him out. I don’t like that this pervert is torturing him _right now_ for the fun of it. I don’t like it at all!”

William takes another drag. It might be the first time ever that it sinks in that Dimitri is as much invested in this, in Andrej, as he himself is. It’s wonderful and frightening, because if Andrej would choose Dimitri…he could be with Dimitri. They could be together.  
He doesn’t want to think about it. He can’t afford to think about this. If he’s honest, he can’t afford to love Andrej either, but that, that is not an option anymore.

“I don’t like it either. But at least we know he’ll be alive when we get to him tomorrow.”

“You trust this Tobias guy?” Dimitri asks, playing with his matches. William thinks he looks like he wants to set something on fire. William can understand that desire only too well.

“I don’t trust him, but I know him. I’ve seen how he works. I _know_ how he works. Andrej will be alive when we get there.”

“But that doesn’t mean he won’t fuck us over and kill us all except for William,” Dimitri concludes.

She nods. “Maybe he’ll keep you alive as well. It’s always good to have more poisonous Hunter blood.”

“I feel so special,” Dimitri says.

William laughs, startled. “Oh fuck. I need to kill something. Now.”

Dimitri gives him a look, but doesn’t object. Emilia nods in understanding.

~+~  
Hunting is a single-minded business. It kills everything except the instinct to find, stalk and kill prey.  
His body takes over for him, it’s nice to not have to think about anything at the moment. Usually he takes the time to look for someone who looks delicious and fuckable, but not tonight. Tonight he only wants someone with a lot of blood, maybe someone who’ll put up a fight, he doesn’t know. His body does.  
When he sinks his teeth into the neck of the drug-dealer it’s bliss. For a few minutes he forgets everything else. The only thing that matters is the hunger, the blood rushing from his victim into his own veins.  
William lets the body sink down and sits beside it on the dirty ground. He leans his head against the grimy wall and breathes. He always feels better when he eats someone. But then everyone feels better when they eat something delicious.

~+~  
“Feeling better?” Emilia asks when he comes home. He wanted to stay out longer, but he needs to sleep a bit before they can face the whole hostage exchange thing. Even if he thinks that he will not be able to sleep.

“Yeah, a bit,” he answers. “Where’s Dimitri?”

“Sleeping.”

“Sleeping?”

“I might or might not have put something into his coffee,” she answers shrugging.

“He will be so pissed off at you when he wakes up.”

“He needs to sleep, William. He is only human.”

“Yeah…” he enters the living room and sits down next to her. She pours him a whisky and he nods his thanks, gulping it down. And only then he notices that she is drinking tea. “Oh fuck. I hate you too!”

“You need sleep. I’ll wake you soon enough,” she answers, stroking his cheek.  
He wants to get up and do something about it, but whatever she gave him it takes an effect fast. He doesn’t think he can even get up from the couch anymore. “Lay down, why don’t you?” she whispers. He really, really hates her, but it seems like a good idea. To close his eyes and just sleep for a while.

William wakes up to yelling and he wants to yell too. Dimitri is on it like it’s nobody’s business. William smiles despite himself.

“You drugged me!” Dimitri screams, it comes from the kitchen and sounds like he made that statement a few times already. He probably has.

“I drugged William as well and it was for your own good,” she answers.

“Our own good?” he shoots in their direction. He knows why she did it, but he still is pissed at her for it.

“You’ll get over it,” she answers, sweetly. “Get dressed. Barbara and her girls will be here soon.”

“Sure.” There is nothing else to do now anyway. They’ll just go with the girls’ game plan, because these girls were leading armies before he was even born.

~+~  
Barbara is all business as she explains the plan. It’s not very complicated, but Emilia said that the best plans are the simple ones. He has to trust her, he has no clue about leading armies or making war. Dimitri looks like he knows what she is talking about. The other girls just nod in all the right places. He doesn’t know their names and he doesn’t care for them either right now. He maybe will when they come out on the other side victorious. They keep stealing glances at him. He’s sure they know what he is.

~+~  
He rides with Emilia in the car. Dimitri is with Barbara and her girls. They were supposed to meet Tobias and his gang (or whatever) alone in an old warehouse with the number 13. Emilia had rolled her eyes at that. William understands, Emilia really hates the stupid clichés and if that isn’t a stupid cliché he doesn’t know what is.

They drive in silence, not even the radio is on and William tries not to think in what condition Andrej is in. ‘Alive’ doesn’t mean anything if you are being held hostage by psycho vampires. He knows he needs to stay calm and trust the girls to handle this, but it’s really fucking hard.

 

~12~  
William suppresses a shiver as they enter the warehouse. It looks abandoned. Foreboding even.

“Welcome,” a man says, stepping out of the shadows.

“Tobias,” Emilia answers with a slight nod. William has no clue why the fuck they are being polite here, but he’ll go with it. He doesn’t want to get them killed or Andrej for that matter.

“Emilia,” he says and then with an amused look : “William. You are prettier than I remember you.”

“I don’t remember you,” he answers.

Tobias smiles. “Of course not. We never met.”

Oh, fuck all the mind games, he thinks.

“You didn’t make him then?” Emilia asks.

“No. How could I when it takes an infected vampire to make one like William,” he says smoothly.  
William hates him. He doesn’t waste time on hating people, usually that is, but he takes the time to feel the hate and rage inside him now.  
“It would be suicide,” he adds with a smile. Like they were stupid and needed to be educated on that subject. How to make a living, poisonous vampire weapon 101. William wants to roll his eyes. And this Tobias guy likes to hear himself talk. He is the worst kind of villain. He would maybe laugh in Tobias’ handsome face if it weren’t for Andrej.

“So, why don’t you make others then? Why do you need me?” he asks. He has enough of this.

“You are the only one who survived,” Tobias answers and William really doesn’t want to know anymore.

“This isn’t bullet-proof then. I’m shocked.”

Tobias smiles, he looks like a shark when he does it. It’s disturbing. “You want your Hunter back, you will come with me.”

Emilia tenses. “I want to see him first,” she says.

Tobias nods. It looks like he’s granting a child a wish. William really hates him. Seriously. He is glad that Dimitri isn’t here. He would want to try and rip this bastards’ heart out just to see him bleed.  
“Bring him in,” Tobias says to the shadows.

~+~  
Andrej feels like someone does when he’s been held captive and been tortured just for the fun of it as well, but he can at least walk alone which he counts as a win. He hopes Dimitri will rip this guy's heart out and do it slowly with a spoon maybe. He isn’t so sure on the details yet. His head feels heavy and his body hurts like hell.  
The vampires holding him up don’t say a word, but they wear clothes to protect themselves from his blood. They’re too close and they’re smelling him, sniffing and licking their lips. Well, he thinks, just come and take a bite. He knows they won’t. He bets Tobias trained them not to give in into temptation. He is sure it was close to torture.  
He stumbles into the empty dark hall of the warehouse, blinking.

“Here, see? Still alive,” Tobias says.  
Andrej can see William and Emilia. William is practically vibrating with wrath. It’s reassuring.

“Hi,” he says, waving his fingers a bit, but he doesn’t try to smile. It hurts too much. It even hurts to be standing upright.

“Hi,” William answers, his voice tender.

“Now, Emilia, just take him before I change my mind about the whole thing.”  
She reaches out her hand and Andrej is being pushed forwards. She is at his side in a flash, holding him up, her hands gentle around him.

“He’s not staying here, is he?” Andrej whispers.

“Quiet now,” she answers, stroking over his head. His blood soaks her dress, but she doesn’t seem to mind. She isn’t as paranoid about his blood as the rest of them. She never was.

“I don’t like this,” he says quietly.

“I don’t like this either, but we need to go now, okay?”  
He nods against her shoulder.

~+~  
She drives like the devil is chasing them. Andrej tries to keep still in the car, but everything hurts like hell. They left William behind. They left him with this lunatic who made William.

“We left him,” he says softly.

“We didn’t leave him, Andrej. We just need to get you out of the danger zone first. He cares about you. He wanted you safe.”

“You’re going back for him?”

“Dimitri is going back for him. I’ll stay with you.”

“You don’t trust Tobias.”

“Are you insane? Of course I don’t!” she laughs, throwing him a look over her shoulder.

“He’s evil, Emilia. Seriously dark and evil.”

“I know, honey, I know.”

~+~  
Dimitri doesn’t like to work with people he doesn’t know. When he’s honest he doesn’t like working with people. Period.  
And Barbara kind of creeps him out as well. She is just too... he can’t even describe it because he doesn’t have the words.

“That was Emilia. She and Andrej are on their way to the safe house,” she says, putting the phone away.

“Okay. So we can get William out of there and then kill them all,” Dimitri answers.  
She throws a sharp smile his way.

“Yes, we can.”

~+~  
Tobias isn’t in the slightest surprised when Dimitri storms the warehouse. William thinks he wouldn’t be either if he were in Tobias’ place.

“Well, the other Hunter. How nice,” he says with a smile like he doesn’t care at all. “So, you and Emilia are back to rescue the kid? Charming.”

“Well,” Dimitri answers with a grin, cutting his palm, “not quite. But you’re close.”

“You know that I am prepared for this, don’t you?”

“No,” Barbara says stepping out of the shadows, “I think you’re not.”  
And then all hell breaks loose.

~+~  
William has no idea what to do. He has really no clue, because he never used to fight. Thank god Barbara and her girls know exactly what to do. They’re slicing their way through the shadow men like they’re made of butter. It’s beautiful and disturbing. There is blood everywhere.  
Tobias is still in the middle of the room, like he doesn’t care one way or other. It’s disturbing to say the least.  
Dimitri grabs his arm with his non-bloody hand. “You should get out of here now!”  
William nods, he can’t help anyone anyway.  
“Get the car and drive as fast as you can,” Dimitri instructs.  
William hugs him tightly and then steps away before Dimitri can hit him for it.  
He gets into the car and drives like hell into the direction of the safe-house.

~+~  
Somewhere between fighting shadow men and trying to get William out of the warehouse Dimitri loses sight of Tobias, but that is okay, he reasons. He is sure they will get him.  
Barbara gives him a look and then smiles widely, winks, slices someone’s head in two and throws herself into the battle again. She is a warrior librarian. It’s kind of hot.

 

~13~  
“I knew you would come here,” Emilia says, stepping out of the shadows.

Tobias spares her a glance and then fixes his gaze on William and Andrej. “It was so easy to follow you. You’re like lambs.”

“With swords,” Emilia says, politely. She is smiling, she can’t help it. This whole thing reminds her of the time she killed Bryan. Except that this floor is hardwood and it will be a bitch to clean the blood of it.  
Maybe Barbara knows a specialist.

“It doesn’t matter. I’m not him and you nearly lost against him.”

“No, you’re not, but I am not that young anymore either.” She cocks her head. “And I am not alone this time.”

“You have a half-dead Hunter and a vampire weapon that doesn’t want to be one…”

“Yes and some of Barbara’s girls,” she answers calmly. “You shouldn’t have come.”  
He doesn’t even know what hits him. Three swords with Andrej’s blood on them pierce through his skin. There is screaming and harsh breathing and then he’s on his knees, bleeding on the floor and Emilia does what she has to, what she did when they were fighting for their freedom: she cuts his head off and lets the girls do the rest.

~+~  
William never wanted to see how a vampire is killed. How this powerful creature is being cut into pieces – still living pieces, trying to put themselves together – and then the heart being taken out so they can burn it first. When that’s done the girls burn the rest of Tobias.

~+~  
“This isn’t over,” Barbara says.

Emilia nods. “I know. I bet he made more. I bet he knows now what he needed to know. And he sure as hell had partners. He was too calm about all of this.”

Barbara doesn’t look happy about it all. “Shit is happening. I know it, you know it. I think the council should know it too.”

Emilia bites her lips. “You mean about William?”

“And Andrej and Dimitri. This isn’t only our fight now.”

“This will get really messy.”

“You want me to talk to the Hunters, don’t you?” Dimitri asks from the doorway.  
Emilia nods, not looking at him. He lights a cigarette, she can smell the smoke. She likes his cigarettes.

“That would be good. Tobias might be dead, but this was in no way a one-man operation. Someone is creating weapons against vampires, against us, and they do it by using Hunter-blood. Do the math,” Barbara throws in. She doesn’t like it, but then no one does.

“I can try, but you know the Hunter-bunch. Paranoid as hell. I’m sure they’ll think I’m bewitched or whatever…”

Emilia looks at him then and sees him smile. “You are bewitched or whatever.”

“Yeah, but they don’t need to know that for sure, do they?” he answers.

“No, they don’t.”

~+~  
Andrej is out of it for two days straight and it makes William crazy to only be able to sit there and wait for him to wake up. Dimitri is restless as well, chain-smoking on the balcony when William finds him in the early morning hours.

“You know, I wish the Hunter part would come with superhuman healing powers as well, like in Buffy,” he says, exhaling smoke. Dimitri is on constant alert now. No one can sneak up on him anymore. Not even William or Emilia.

“I wish for it too.”  
Dimitri nods, flipping his butt onto the pavement under them and lights two new cigarettes. He hands one over to William.

“We don’t know if he’ll wake up,” he states.  
William really doesn’t want to hear that. He inhales deeply and lets the smoke curl around his lungs.

“He will.”

“You’ve seen it in the intestines of chickens?” Dimitri asks.

“I have no idea how to read the intestines of chickens, but if I knew I would do it in a heartbeat.”

“Grandmother used to do that. She was very accurate,” Dimitri answers.

William nods. He believes that in a second. “And she didn’t pass it on?”

“She tried, but I find the intestines of chickens disturbing,” Dimitri confesses, exhaling smoke.  
William smiles, but keeps silent.  
They stay like that until the sun comes up and then Dimitri leaves to go to bed. William knows he’s checking in on Andrej as well.

~+~  
Emilia is talking with Barbara on the phone in the kitchen when Andrej sits down on a chair. She stares at him and then tells Barbara that she'll call back.

“You’re up,” she says. He nods. “And I didn’t hear you entering at all.”

He shrugs. “I feel like death warmed over,” he answers.

She puts the phone down and gets up to make tea. “You look good.” And the weird thing is he does look good. She is glad, but he really shouldn’t look as well as he does if you consider what he has been through.

“Thanks, that’s nice, but I really feel like death warmed over and I can’t-,” he stops and she turns to look at him.

“What?”

“I can’t really remember what they did during my stay there,” Andrej answers carefully.

“It will come back.”

“I’m not sure I want it to come back, Emilia,” he confesses in a small voice.

She nods. “Drink some tea, okay?”

“Where are William and Dimitri?”

“I sent them grocery shopping. They made me crazy with their brooding and concerned looks.”

“And Tobias?”

“He’s dead,” she answers flatly.

“You don’t think this is over, do you?”

“It might be for now,” she replies, because it’s the truth. She sits down and looks at him. “You really look good.”

“This is a concern for you. You don’t think I should.”

“I don’t know what they did to you, but I know what Tobias liked to do to his human and vampire prisoners and you shouldn’t even be able to sit,” she says.

“That’s reassuring.”

“I know it’s not,” she answers gently, taking his hand and squeezing. “But we have to face the facts so nothing can surprise us anymore.”

“You know it doesn’t work like that. And there is no doctor who could just check me out and see what they did to me.”

“Andrej,” she says softly and he looks up at her and from their hands.

“I know what you want to ask, but I don’t think so. I mean, I can’t really remember, but it would’ve been madness, right?”  
She nods, it would have been madness, but it doesn’t mean Tobias didn’t try to prove a freaking point. That he could resists the blood even while having sex. She squeezes his hand harder, but doesn’t know what to answer him. So she keeps quiet.

~+~  
“You’re up,” is the first thing William says. Dimitri doesn’t say anything at all as he crosses the kitchen, puts the groceries on the table and hugs the life out of Andrej. Andrej buries his head in his cousin’s chest and breathes him in. He smells like smoke and rain and washing powder. He smells like home and being safe.  
William waits, hovering at the edge of Andrej’s vision. Andrej lets Dimitri hug him one last time, brush a kiss over his neck and then lets go, turns to look at William.

“Yeah, I’m up,” he answers with a small smile. He is pretty sure it looks shy.

“Thank fucking god!” William says and Andrej faceplants into his chest because it seems like William is going to stand there and stare for the rest of his life.

“I’m glad you’re okay. I was worried,” Andrej whispers against his shirt and feels William shiver and then snort a laugh, his body shaking with it.

“I’m glad _you_ are okay!” he answers, tightening his hold on Andrej. It nearly hurts, but it’s good. It feels like it should feel, desperate and loved and with an edge of pain.

 

~end~


End file.
